One of the constant themes that we were hearing from the professional world of poker in the US after Black Friday was that those who wanted to continue being involved in online poker had to leave home and play in other jurisdictions, which was unfair for those who depended on the game as a form of livelihood. Now that the attitude towards online poker in the US is becoming much more relaxed and even regulated, steps are being taken for the online professionals to begin returning home – and this is certainly the case for Jamie Kerstetter, who recently moved back to New Jersey after a time spent abroad in Mexico.
Settling in to an apartment in Brigantine has been a very different change from the lifestyle which she was experiencing over the years previous to moving back, and it must feel like a huge relief for the thirty one year old player. She may currently only have four games going at once – a far cry from the twenty which she would have going in at once in Mexico – but the smaller market in New Jersey is nonetheless already growing, and with the idea of interstate or even international compacts being raised, the tables may soon expand. Either way, at least she is home in the US – playing through one of the accounts which has gone live in New Jersey since November 21, when online poker went live in the state. She had live in Rosarito, Mexico, for two years – a place which she now describes as a calm and welcoming beach town, despite the fact that it was also close to the activities of a Mexican drug cartel. The town was full of online poker professionals who had needed to resettle after 2011, including her poker playing boyfriend Zach Donovan, who she left there when she returned to the US.
She was known at that time by the screen name AndtheLawWon, a fitting moniker for someone who had been forced from her home and family after a court ruling changed the state of online poker dramatically – something which seems especially unfair now that we know that it was only to be a temporary state of affairs. Now no one is happier than her mother to welcome her back to the US, and she is somewhere where she belongs. She lives with two other poker players who are enjoying the chance to play at home once again – Patti Haggerty and John Allan Hinds, who are known respectively as Patticakes and Beastro at the online poker tables. Kerstetter now enjoys a mutual arrangement with PartyPoker which has seen her transform into something of a local hero, with an undisclosed salary as well as other perks, which keep her at the tables night in and night out. “We know her by reputation,” says Jeffrey Haas, global poker director for partypoker.com of Gibraltar-based bwin.party. “She’s a consistently successful poker player.” Like many poker pros, she was training to be a lawyer when she found poker – and has never looked back since.