DECEMBER 21, 2009 - 5:34:09 PM PST TEXAS ATTORNEY WINS POKER TRIAL by: WSOP Staff

New Orleans, LA (December 19, 2009) – Bronson Tucker won the most recent Bayou Poker Challenge tournament held at Harrah’s New Orleans.  The $500 (+70) buy-in No-Limit Hold’em tournament attracted a modest field size of 45 entries, due largely to the $3,000 buy-in championship event taking place on the same day.  This was the 12th of 15 events on this year’s Bayou Poker Challenge schedule.  The two-day tournament generated a prize pool totaling $21,825.

This marked Tucker’s first tournament victory.  He had two previous fourth-place finishes.  His first cash took place at the Scotty Nguyen Poker Challenge in Oklahoma.  The second occurred at a major online poker site.  His share of the prize money for this victory amounted to $8,730.

Tucker is a 32-year-old attorney, from Round Rock, TX – which is located near Austin.  Tucker is part of an agency that trains trial judges around the country.  He is part of a team that instructs judges on legal protocol inside the courtroom, knowledge which seemed to pay off at the poker table, as well.  The native Oklahoman is married and has a 2-year-old daughter.  In addition to the prize money he won, Tucker also received a stylish gold ring, similar to the coveted jewelry awarded to most WSOP Circuit winners.  The larger buy-in events at this year’s Bayou series include gold rings for the winners.

Only the tournament’s top five finishers collected prize money.  Players were eliminated in the following order:

5th Place – John Ducote, a 40-year-old salesman from Baton Rouge, LA was the fifth place finisher.  He barely squeezed into the prize money, which was his third time to cash in a major tournament after in-the-money finishes at WSOP Circuit events in New Orleans and Tunica.  In his daily job, Ducote sells restaurant equipment.  His commission for this effort amounted to $1,746 in prize money.

4th Place – Tony Sevnsom, a professional poker player from Houston, TX ended up taking fourth place.  He has several previous noteworthy cashes, including a final table appearance at the WSOP in Las Vegas.  Sevnsom received a payout totaling $2,400.

3rd Place – Larry Keene, a retired part-time poker player from Fitzgerald, GA finished in third place.  Keene previously had a long career in the U.S. Navy.  This marked his third final table appearance at a major poker tournament. Keene pocketed $3,492 in cash for this effort.

2nd Place – James Brown, a 74-year-old retiree from Houston, TX was the runner up.  The ex-Marine went as deep as possible given his starting stack size, but ran out of momentum late and lost the final pot of the tournament with pocket sixes to Bronson Tucker’s A-10.  A ten on the turn basically sealed Brown’s fate and he ended up with $5,456 in prize money.

1st Place – Bronson Tucker, a 32-year-old attorney from Round Rock, TX was the winner.  He collected $8,730 and bragging rights for his first major tournament victory.