Unintended unfortunate remark

[bluejak]

Law 73F starts:

 

When a violation of the Proprieties described in this law results in damage to an innocent opponent, ....

If someone makes an unfortunate remark which misleads an opponent we use this Law to adjust, right?

 

Now, I have been asked on rec.games.bridge where in Law 73 it makes such a remark illegal if the remark is unintended. Because, if it is not illegal per Law 73, how can we apply Law 73F?

 

Re-reading Law 73 has left me puzzled: anyone like to help?

[Bbradley62]

B. Inappropriate Communication between Partners

1. Partners shall not communicate by means such as... extraneous remarks

F. Violation of Proprieties

When a violation of the Proprieties described in this law results in damage to an innocent opponent, if the Director determines that an innocent player has drawn a false inference from a remark, manner, tempo or the like of an opponent who has no demonstrable bridge reason for the action, and who could have known, at the time of the action, that the action could work to his benefit, the Director shall award an adjusted score (see Law 12C).

"could have known" seems to be a much lower threshhold than "intended to mislead".

[blackshoe]

My read of 73B1 suggests that the communication does not have to be deliberate (that's 73B2 anyway). So I agree with Bbradley.

[bluejak]

Sorry, I have not made myself clear. Sure, Law 73B1 deals with unintended communication between partners, but so do 16B and 73C.

 

What I am talking about is where an opponent goes wrong because of a remark. Suppose I say "I wonder whether I can make twelve tricks". Assume it is an innocent remark, because I have not realised that a certain happening means even 4♥ is in danger. Now the defence tries a very dangerous defence because of my remark, but let 4♥ through when it was going off.

 

The remark is not intended to deceive [it would be easy if it were]. What makes it illegal? What brings Law 73F into play?

[pran]

Sorry, I have not made myself clear. Sure, Law 73B1 deals with unintended communication between partners, but so do 16B and 73C.

 

What I am talking about is where an opponent goes wrong because of a remark. Suppose I say "I wonder whether I can make twelve tricks". Assume it is an innocent remark, because I have not realised that a certain happening means even 4♥ is in danger. Now the defence tries a very dangerous defence because of my remark, but let 4♥ through when it was going off.

 

The remark is not intended to deceive [it would be easy if it were]. What makes it illegal? What brings Law 73F into play?

A player may not attempt to mislead an opponent by means of remark or gesture, by the haste or hesitancy of a call or play (as in hesitating before playing a singleton), the manner in which a call or play is made or by any purposeful deviation from correct procedure.

When a violation of the Proprieties described in this law results in damage to an innocent opponent, if the Director determines that an innocent player has drawn a false inference from a remark, manner, tempo, or the like, of an opponent who has no demonstrable bridge reason for the action, and who could have known, at the time of the action, that the action could work to his benefit, the Director shall award an adjusted score (see Law 12C).

Law 73F suspends any requirement to show intent, it is sufficient to show that the player could have known that his remark (for which he had no bridge reason) could work to his benefit.

 

Even a possible fact that the player did not imagine the unfortunate (for his opponents) consequence from an extraneous remark does not excuse him from liability.

[blackshoe]

No. 73D requires an intent to deceive. An innocent remark without such intent is not a "violation of the Proprieties described in this law".

 

It remains to explore what "communicate" in 73B1 actually means.

[axman]

Law 73F suspends any requirement to show intent, it is sufficient to show that the player could have known that his remark (for which he had no bridge reason) could work to his benefit.

 

Even a possible fact that the player did not imagine the unfortunate (for his opponents) consequence from an extraneous remark does not excuse him from liability.

 

For the most part I concur with blackshoe's parsing:

 

blackshoe

Posted Today, 21:09

 

No. 73D requires an intent to deceive. An innocent remark without such intent is not a "violation of the Proprieties described in this law".

 

It remains to explore what "communicate" in 73B1 actually means.

[dburn]

Bluejak's construction of Law 73 is quite correct; it does not apply in the case of an innocent remark. Pran's is quite wrong; there is no violation of Law 73 unless there was an attempt to mislead (or an illegal communication between partners, obviously irrelevant here). Law 73 does not apply to this case at all.

 

Fortunately, Law 74B2 makes the remark an irregularity ("a player should refrain from [...] making gratuitous comments during the auction and play"), and Law 23 then permits the Director to adjust the score ("Whenever, in the opinion of the Director, an offender could have been aware at the time of his irregularity that this could well damage the non-offending side [...] the Director awards an adjusted score if he considers the offending side has gained an advantage through the irregularity.")

 

This was not what the Law-makers intended should happen, of course; they should have widened the scope of 73F to include 74 as well as 73. But they have been saved from the consequences of their incompetence by a fluke; Law 23 was supposed to be a specific Law relating to irregularities during the auction period, but they forgot to include that specification in the Law itself, so now it handles just about everything that they have omitted to handle properly elsewhere.

[campboy]

Normally when we adjust using 73F (say for following suit slowly with a small doubleton) the rationale for so doing is that, while we do not necessarily believe there was an infraction of 73D2, there was an infraction of 73D1 because the player wasn't as careful as that law requires. Can we do the same thing here? Does making fatuous remarks count as a variation of manner?

[gnasher]

Does making fatuous remarks count as a variation of manner?

I think that would be stretching the definition of "manner" beyond breaking point.

[pran]

My first reaction when reading OP was "Law 23 - of course" (Appliccable to violations of any law in the book)

 

Now, with the question centered on Law 73 I don't immediately buy the argument that the remark was unintended, it was deliberate wasn't it? Or is the player in question one that usually thinks loud?

 

And how do we know that the remark was no attempt to mislead opponents so that we can apply Law 73D2? The offender's self-serving statement?

 

We still have the clause "could have known" in Law 73F, and as we know this clause is there so that the director shall not have to show deliberate intent, only a possibility.

 

But all this is really immaterial. If we cannot apply Law 73 we can certainly apply Law 74 (particularly Law 74C3) together with Law 23 and achieve exactly the same result - an adjusted score.

[blackshoe]

It is important to choose the right law(s) when ruling. Otherwise, we'll be back at the old Kaplan dictum: "decide what you want to do, and then find a law to justify it".

[Trinidad]

There is the theoretical approach to this problem:

 

We know that the player didn't intend to deceive. (It's a given in the OP.)

Therefore, 73D does not apply. As a result, we need to use 74B2 and Law 23, following Dburn's reasoning. Result: We adjust.

 

In practice, we never know whether the player had the intent to deceive. So we have to ask ourselves: What would the ruling be if the player intended to deceive and what would it be if there was no intent? If there was an intent, we can simply use 73D2 and 73F. The result: We adjust.

 

In other words, the intent is irrelevant. That is very nice since as a TD, I don't want to analyse what goes on in people's minds if I can avoid it (but I will if needed).

 

Rik

[jallerton]

Bluejak's construction of Law 73 is quite correct; it does not apply in the case of an innocent remark. Pran's is quite wrong; there is no violation of Law 73 unless there was an attempt to mislead (or an illegal communication between partners, obviously irrelevant here). Law 73 does not apply to this case at all.

 

Fortunately, Law 74B2 makes the remark an irregularity ("a player should refrain from [...] making gratuitous comments during the auction and play"), and Law 23 then permits the Director to adjust the score ("Whenever, in the opinion of the Director, an offender could have been aware at the time of his irregularity that this could well damage the non-offending side [...] the Director awards an adjusted score if he considers the offending side has gained an advantage through the irregularity.")

 

I agree with this.

 

This was not what the Law-makers intended should happen, of course; they should have widened the scope of 73F to include 74 as well as 73. But they have been saved from the consequences of their incompetence by a fluke; Law 23 was supposed to be a specific Law relating to irregularities during the auction period, but they forgot to include that specification in the Law itself, so now it handles just about everything that they have omitted to handle properly elsewhere.

 

I don't think this is true. Law 23 in the 2007 Laws is the equivalent of what was Law 72B1 in the 1997 Laws (Law 72 in the 1997 Laws was headed "General Principles"). As the 1997 Law 23 was covered by 72B1 it seems that 72B1 was moved and renamed in the 2007 version. Since then the WBLFC has clarified:

 

Law 23. This Law is a general Law. It should not be inferred from its position in the Law Book that it only applies to the auction.