Blackjack King Scores $15M in 6 Months

The house always wins, right? Not for blackjack aficionado Don Johnson, who’s won $15.1 million over six months at Atlantic City casinos. The Pennsylvania man took home $4.23 million from Caesars, some $5 million from Borgata, and $5.8 million from Tropicana—and he scored that last bundle in a matter of 12 hours. How does he do it? “There's no magic to this. Eventually, someone would whack them. I'm just glad it was me,” he tells the Press of Atlantic City. But when it comes to wagers, he knows what he's doing: Johnson runs a company that uses betting software for horse racing.

Johnson began his gambling career on a much smaller scale 15 years ago, placing $25 blackjack bets. Last month, though, he was allowed to bet $100,000 per hand—“the highest I’ve ever heard of,” he says. He may be rolling in cash now, but he doesn’t consider himself a pro gambler, and he still wears sweatshirts and jeans. He’s also adamant that there’s no funny business. “I don't do anything like the MIT guys" immortalized in the film 21, he says. "I can figure things out on my own.” Click through to Gawker for more. (More Blackjack stories.)