person-to-person bets / competitions with money

[yngve]

I live in Florida, and I have two questions about the legality of personal betting.

First question: suppose I tell a friend of mine - hey lets play rock-paper-scissors. The winner gets $20 from the loser.
Do we violate any laws doing this - state or federal?

Second question: suppose a third friend of mine invited us to his house to play more rock-paper-scissors for money, and he charges everyone that comes a $1 entrance fee. No fees on winners proceeds, only this entrance fee. Would this 3rd friend be in violation of any laws?

 

[cyjeff]

See, if we do your homework, you won't learn how to look it up.

 

[yngve]

I've tried to do my homework, and if I understand correctly, in Florida you may 'play' with money with your friends, but not for any amount over $10.
The reason I am unsure if this applies to my example - playing rock paper scissors - is that all the legal text I can find seem to be very specifically written for poker and card games.

So if the same rules applies to playing random games like RPS I don't know. I'm a little stuck in my homework there.

And as far as the entrance fee goes, I have come up blank. I am pretty sure someone may not set up a casino like venue where the house collects a percentage of the pot of each game, but could not find anything about entrance fees.

So any helpful hints or pointers for my homework would be appreciated!

 

[Zigner]

I've tried to do my homework, and if I understand correctly, in Florida you may 'play' with money with your friends, but not for any amount over $10.
The reason I am unsure if this applies to my example - playing rock paper scissors - is that all the legal text I can find seem to be very specifically written for poker and card games.

So if the same rules applies to playing random games like RPS I don't know. I'm a little stuck in my homework there.

And as far as the entrance fee goes, I have come up blank. I am pretty sure someone may not set up a casino like venue where the house collects a percentage of the pot of each game, but could not find anything about entrance fees.

So any helpful hints or pointers for my homework would be appreciated!

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