Historic Con of the Night: three-card monte

three-card monte: a confidence game where a dealer shuffles three cards on a box or crate, luring in a gullible tourist to pick the winning card, but uses sleight of hand to trick the player. The dealer aways has  a team--a shill, a loud and enthusiastic participant, who lures people in, a lookout for the cops and a plant, playing a fake winner. There is also the muscle, who will stop a player who tries to leave with money he wins. Smart three-card monte teams will make sure the members are multi-ethnic. The game has been around for 150 years, but has been rare in Times Square since the business-improvement district cracked down on the con in the early 1990s. The New York Times reported on October 16, 2016 that there has been a surge in three-card monte arrests. A man arrested in Chelsea in October 2016 had a 35-year rap sheet for this particular con, starting in Times Square in 1981.