'The Phil Ivey of Attorneys' and Vegas Legend David Chesnoff Represents Millionaire Paul Phua

'Who you gonna call' is not really a question for gamblers and jet-set thrill-seekers who get into trouble in Sin City, nor for the casinos where the trouble may have started. The obvious choice is David Chesnoff, who has been practicing as a criminal defense attorney in Vegas for nearly 35 years.

Chesnoff is now in the news again with a high-profile case after the arrest of millionaire @Paul Phua. Well-known to poker fans from super high-roller events and the Macau Big Game, Phua is allegedly connected to a Chinese crime syndicate - the Hong Kong-based 14K Triad - and is accused of running an illegal sports betting ring from Ceasar's Palace. His lawyer denied these charges. “This is a very sophisticated, intelligent individual who wants to defend himself,” Chesnoff was reported saying by the Las Vegas Review Journal.

Bruno Mars, Myke Tyson, Paris Hilton - just a few of his famous Vegas clients.

In view of the dazzling string of celebrities whom Chesnoff has represented successfully since 1980 (when he first arrived in Vegas), we have no doubt Phua will get the best possible defense. A great article about David Chesnoff by Michael Kaplan - Busted in Vegas? Gotta Call David Chesnoff - cites some of the stars of poker that have profted from his advice over the years:

"He also represented poker pro Mike “The Mouth” Matusow on a drug charge. “Mike was in deep trouble,” Chesnoff says. “He wound up going from facing state prison time to a very short sentence in the jail downtown”—where @Mike Matusow still managed to lose a six-figure sum by placing sports bets with bookies on the outside. “His whole life would have been unfairly different if I hadn’t been able to convince the court that this was really aberrant behavior on his part and that he really wasn’t a drug dealer.”

Chesnoff established himself as a favorite of poker stars, advising @Phil Hellmuth, @Johnny Chan, and the late @David 'Chip' Rees, among others. When @Jamie Gold won the World Series of Poker in 2006, there was a dispute with a card-playing TV producer who claimed to have been promised half of Gold’s winnings; Chesnoff went to bat for the producer and the suit was eventually settled. After poker great @Phil Ivey Phil Ivey enlisted Chesnoff to represent him in his 2009 divorce, the line at the hold’em tables was that Ivey had hired the Phil Ivey of attorneys. These days, every casino boss in town has Chesnoff flagged on his iPhone. “I get calls from casino executives to help big customers of theirs, and it isn’t to help because they want to see the guys go away,” he says. “Casino management understands that people are in Vegas and things will happen."