[inquiry]

Somewhere I think I saw a similar situation in one of these forums in the past,but I can't find it. Amazingly enough this happened today.

South led a spade(!) and West put all 13 cards on the table. North then said wait a minute, I bid 3♠, West disagreed, but when the director arrived, the other 3 players agreed North had bid 3♠ over 3♥ (generally 3 to 1 in dispute, go with majority). The director actually ruled that West and Sooth didn't agree that a 3♠ bid occurred (given the opening lead and West statement) and ruled 3♥ as the final contract and ordered play to continue. Thoughts?

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[blackshoe]

South had a momentary memory lapse, and then recalled — was reminded of — the true situation. Then the director ruled that South did not recall the truth? Pfui.

This is clear director error. Either that or s/he willfully ruled incorrectly in order to avoid dealing with thirteen penalty cards. Either way, TD error. Apply Law 82C.

[inquiry]

blackshoe, on 2016-February-24, 19:24, said:

South had a momentary memory lapse, and then recalled — was reminded of — the true situation. Then the director ruled that South did not recall the truth? Pfui.

This was the situation.

blackshoe, on 2016-February-24, 19:24, said:

This is clear director error. Either that or s/he willfully ruled incorrectly in order to avoid dealing with thirteen penalty cards. Either way, TD error. Apply Law 82C.

I remember reading in one of your forum(s?) a similar situation where you said you would even sit down and turn the 13 penalty cards if the player got angry and walked off to cool down. So I told the director when I heard about this hand (it was a major topic after the event) that there should have been 13 penalty cards. He was leaning that way but finally decided to go with 2 on 2 and decide the contract was 3♥. I thought that was most probably wrong based on my reading of the laws, and then I had read your forums in the past for a similar situation (without declarer adding to problem by making the opeing led at trick one).

Second strange occurrence at this club in a week. The week before, last round, we had a fouled board where all four hands were rotated one pocket clockwise in the board when it arrived at our table. At least I think he got that one right, 1/2 board pp for offenders at one table (instead of normal 1/4) and let ACBLScore correct the score (board fouled on next to last round, so only at one table).

[pran]

inquiry, on 2016-February-24, 16:54, said:

Somewhere I think I saw a similar situation in one of these forums in the past,but I can't find it. Amazingly enough this happened today.

South led a spade(!) and West put all 13 cards on the table. North then said wait a minute, I bid 3♠, West disagreed, but when the director arrived, the other 3 players agreed North had bid 3♠ over 3♥ (generally 3 to 1 in dispute, go with majority). The director actually ruled that West and Sooth didn't agree that a 3♠ bid occurred (given the opening lead and West statement) and ruled 3♥ as the final contract and ordered play to continue. Thoughts?

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If West really passed (as the diagram indicates) then that itself confirms that North had the last bid.
But when three players agree that the contract is 3♠ I find it incredible that the Director rules otherwise.
13 penalty cards are legally no problem, but it may cause a challenge for Declarer to make the best out of the situation.

[Vampyr]

It's a pity the players did not leave their bidding cards out until after the opening lead was made.

[Zelandakh]

pran, on 2016-February-25, 01:52, said:

13 penalty cards are legally no problem, but it may cause a challenge for Declarer to make the best out of the situation.

And if Declarer did make the most of the situation, would you not rule that South could have known at the time of leading the spade that it might work to their advantage?

[pran]

pran, on 2016-February-25, 01:52, said:

13 penalty cards are legally no problem, but it may cause a challenge for Declarer to make the best out of the situation.

Zelandakh, on 2016-February-25, 06:26, said:

And if Declarer did make the most of the situation, would you not rule that South could have known at the time of leading the spade that it might work to their advantage?

Possibly. Depending on the circumstances that might influence my ruling, and especially so if I get the impression that the lead out of turn from South was anything like deliberate.

[Zelandakh]

pran, on 2016-February-25, 09:57, said:

Possibly. Depending on the circumstances that might influence my ruling, and especially so if I get the impression that the lead out of turn from South was anything like deliberate.

Does it being deliberate matter for this specific point? "Could have known" and "intent to deceive" are quite different things (and are covered in different Laws).

[inquiry]

pran, on 2016-February-25, 01:52, said:

If West really passed (as the diagram indicates) then that itself confirms that North had the last bid.
But when three players agree that the contract is 3♠ I find it incredible that the Director rules otherwise.
13 penalty cards are legally no problem, but it may cause a challenge for Declarer to make the best out of the situation.

I wasn't at this table, so I am uncertain if West passed or just picked up his bidding cards, but I got the info from two of the players and a subsequent discussion with the director about his ruling.

[wank]

Vampyr, on 2016-February-25, 04:57, said:

It's a pity the players did not leave their bidding cards out until after the opening lead was made.

noone does that outside england.

[Vampyr]

wank, on 2016-February-25, 11:10, said:

noone does that outside england.

And then they get problems like this.

[sanst]

inquiry, on 2016-February-24, 16:54, said:

South led a spade(!) and West put all 13 cards on the table.

So both S and W think that E is declarer.

Quote

North then said wait a minute, I bid 3♠,

Why did N wait till all of West's cards were on the table? He could and should have interrupted W doing so.

Quote

West disagreed, but when the director arrived, the other 3 players agreed North had bid 3♠ over 3♥ (generally 3 to 1 in dispute, go with majority).

So S changed his mind.

Quote

The director actually ruled that West and Sooth didn't agree that a 3♠ bid occurred (given the opening lead and West statement) and ruled 3♥ as the final contract and ordered play to continue.

I don't say that the director didn't make a mistake, but it's not so clear cut as others seem to think. In cases like this it's usually best to assume that the director has investigated the case properly, unless it's obvious that he didn't. He was the only one who spoke to all concerned and could have asked W whether he passed or just picked up the dards.

[LH2650]

blackshoe, on 2016-February-24, 19:24, said:

South had a momentary memory lapse, and then recalled — was reminded of — the true situation. Then the director ruled that South did not recall the truth? Pfui.

This is clear director error. Either that or s/he willfully ruled incorrectly in order to avoid dealing with thirteen penalty cards. Either way, TD error. Apply Law 82C.

Dealing with the 13 penalty cards is easy - the director should tell the player to pick them up. The director has unlimited authority to do this, and the situation was caused by an irregularity by declarer. Offer the defenders the option to accept or reject the lead. Who has unauthorized information is less clear to me, but I think I would say it is declarer.

[VixTD]

LH2650, on 2016-February-25, 18:27, said:

Dealing with the 13 penalty cards is easy - the director should tell the player to pick them up. The director has unlimited authority to do this, and the situation was caused by an irregularity by declarer. Offer the defenders the option to accept or reject the lead. Who has unauthorized information is less clear to me, but I think I would say it is declarer.

I agree that the defender should be told to pick up all their exposed cards, as it was an opponent's irregularity that prompted them to lay down the dummy. They'll be unauthorized information for partner.

The defenders cannot accept the opening lead out of turn from the declaring side - the card is returned to offender's hand (law 24).

[weejonnie]

I think there is plenty of scope under law 47 for the Director to allow West to pick up the cards.

The interesting thing is that if he does then law 16D applies and East is fully entitled to make use of the information of the cards in West's hand. Ever wanted to play double dummy in real life?

[blackshoe]

I don't see why Law 47 has anything to do with this. Can you explain?

[Charlie Yu]

South lead a spade out of turn, therefore EW is damaged right? Does penalty still applies for EW?

[blackshoe]

Charlie Yu, on 2016-March-22, 06:10, said:

South lead a spade out of turn, therefore EW is damaged right?

Maybe, maybe not. Damage is defined as the NOS achieving a lesser result than their expectation absent the infraction. You can't just say "there was an infraction, so there was damage".

[axman]

blackshoe, on 2016-March-22, 15:19, said:

Maybe, maybe not. Damage is defined as the NOS achieving a lesser result than their expectation absent the infraction. You can't just say "there was an infraction, so there was damage".

The law speaks only to when damage exists, it does not speak to what damage is.

[blackshoe]

axman, on 2016-March-23, 07:37, said:

The law speaks only to when damage exists, it does not speak to what damage is.

That's too picky even for me. "Damage exists when, because of an infraction, an innocent side obtains a table result less favorable than would have been the expectation had the infraction not occurred". So what is the damage? Clearly it's the difference between the actual result and the expected result absent the infraction. How else would you define it?