living room i'm on a quarantine exceed my office otherwise i guess i'm just going to get started with my arguments i plan on raising two arguments today time permitting the st is that we possibly alleged rico standing and more specifically that we suffered a direct injury due to defendant's rico violation the sac in his dad to the extent the court disagrees we should at least be given a chance to amend the complaint to fix any deficiencies with our rico claims we've never had an opportunity to do that so let's just jump into what the complaint says i'll admit when i st looked at it i looked at it i was a little overwhelmed it's long but this case is actually very straightforward defendants opened and operated in a legal card room business in close proximity to our lawful cardroom operations that by so doing defendant violated rico pursuant to chapter eighteen of the under code and that we suffered a direct injury as a result namely the loss of revenues and profits that any business would suffer when a competitor suddenly shows up in the market where they're operating  who can lend money to find open and operate a gambling business all these requirements are intended to keep criminal elements outside of gambling so you really can't get a license if you have not have a background at least without going through a pretty lengthy investigation which they never did the predicate acts comprise of their failure to get through those licenses properly by disclosing the criminal backgrounds of the people they two components to the violation one is that they violated the laws of a state or political subdivision in some way throws the predicate acts that we just discussed the other is that they actually operate the gambling business we see it in the language of the tax it makes  it is so i would a good example is the one that they discuss in the supreme court in bridge so in that case which was unanimously decided the supreme court discusses a situation where proximate cause just kind of has to exist and what they say is ok well let's say a defendant lies to businesses customers or its suppliers and customers then stop going to that business proximate cause exists there even though in the state the state was considered the director a victim because the steam the rico violation was state tax fraud and the state suffered a direct concrete economic injury that similar to what this court said in painters where the prescription the doctors to prescribe the drug were not considered the direct victim because they didn't suffer a direct economic injury as a result of the rico violation the nd thing i'd say is that one answer makes clear is that the reason i'm asking that is because i mean there are people who cannot go to your client because they're going to do other five hundred but they also good you know going your clients for other reasons that's sort of a universe i mean the allegations make clear that we are both operating in a small market in the central valley it's not a community that attracts tourists like in new york or in las vegas we also offer a very special ice service card rooms they offer that same service so when they gain a customer we lose one that's all they're creating new customers out of nowhere and that might be true but it might also be even if that you know assuming that is true it might also be true that you lose customers rather sure i actually that would be different if you're given so the district court dismissed our complaint based on a lot of speculative factors as to why we couldn't prove that this was the sole cause i frankly myth that we don't have to prove that but you take that need to we can allege for instance that carbon customers are very unique and loyal to carbon businesses that they aren't interested in any other casinos to the extent those casinos in the exists that we've been in business in this location for several years that where in the best party to tell you whether or not any of these other market conditions cause us to lose a ninety percent drop in revenue as soon as they enter the market and nothing on the face of the community than downtown fresno so they are really there are some markets there they're situated near each other but if it came to that i think their premises is incorrect it is certainly not analogous to the bridges case which is what they're trying to fit into the bridges case there was of course the tax lien sale that was i think it was coach county where that was done and the problem was that with the illegal and not a person going from one is you know to another one whatever it is right i mean there's a multitude of factors i mean there's transportation issues that impact that there's as i mentioned before there's my question i did know by the way that it seemed that they gaming revenue actually declined thirty percent but cash flow declined ninety percent so i'm not sure what that distinction is fine to the point that i judge and i was making is it possible also that the five hundred club suggestion was made that the five hundred club was newly formed and never was properly licensed five hundred club has a history going back in time they were they've been duly licensed the problem that has been a that when this expansion occurred and they were still in the city at that point in time allegedly there were investors who did not obtain the proper licensing to be investors that day but the reality is the five hundred dollars club goes back decades it's well it was in there there's a long standing clientele that goes to the five hundred or so just to clarify that i think that's an important fact that needs to be factored into this whole thing  if is a different marketing approach if you will ok so i think there's really so many different factors that contribute to this alleged market loss everybody in that timeframe problem with essentially trying to advance a diminution of markets your theory for proximate cause and not under answer that doesn't get them where they need to get so i think the trial court was accurate in saying you know what is it that you would tell us what you would do if you were going to have the opportunity to to have frankly all of a said then and all that they've sent up to this point in time is they would simply add additional  injury that should shut down the conversation they say that we've had ample opportunity we've had no opportunity they say that but you can't recover for lost pop this court has said otherwise harmonious