Penalties and Punishment in Chess

 

In 1061, some of the clergy in Italy were caught playing chess.  Cardinal Petrus Damiani (1007-1072) of Ostia imposed a punishment of any clergy playing chess would have to wash 12 poor men’s feet.

 

In 1110, chess players in the monastery of Mt. Athos were excommunicated by the monk John Zonaras (1060-1118) for playing chess.

 

In 1125, several priests in Paris were caught playing chess and excommunicated by Bishop Guy of Paris.

 

In December 1254, King Louis IX (1214-1270) of France banned chess.  Anyone caught playing chess in France was heavily fined.

 

In August 1624, playwright Thomas Middleton (1580-1627) was arrested in London after producing a play, A Game of Chess, which satirized the proposed marriage of Prince Charles of England with a Spanish princess.   The play was the greatest box-office hit in early modern London, filling the Globe Theatre for 9 consecutive days.  After Middleton’s arrest, the play was censored and was not allowed to be shown again as a penalty.  [source: Essay: To what extent is Thomas Middleton’s A Game at Chess a play for audiences of its time and space?, essaysauce.com, Oct 20, 2019]

 

In 1649, Tsar Alexei (1629-1676) banned chess in Russia.  The penalty for playing chess was whipping and imprisonment.

 

In 1848, the suppression of the Hungarian Revolution banned chess clubs in Hungary until 1864.

 

In 1870, Joseph Henry Blackburne (1841-1924) was arrested in Baden-Baden as a French spy for sending chess moves in the mail.  The British government thought they were coded secrets.  It was a German officer that arrested Blackburne and told Blackburne that he was not permitted to talk to anyone.  It turned out that Blackburne’s carriage driver was the French spy.

 

In 1875, Albert W. Ensor was playing chess when he was arrested on a warrant charging him with perjury in an earlier trial.  An examination of the case was postponed until his chess match was finished that he was playing at the time of his arrest.  [source: Buffalo Commercial, Dec 16, 1875, p. 3]

 

In January 1880, at the 5th American Chess Congress in New York, Preston Ware (1821-1890) testified to the tournament committee that his last-round opponent, James Glover Grundy (1855-1919) of England, offered him $20 if he agreed to play for a draw in their game that had been adjourned.  A draw would give Grundy at least 2nd place prize money.  Ware agreed, but complained that Grundy then reneged on the deal and Grundy went on to win the game in 64 moves, and tied for 1st place with 13.5 points out of 18 (with George Mackenzie).  1st place was $500 and 2nd place was $300.  Grundy lost the playoff match with Mackenzie to take 2nd.  When Grundy admitted his guilt, he was forbidden from ever again taking part in an American tournament.  Grundy played in other tournaments, but under false names.  Ware, who score 5.5 points, was suspended for one year from playing chess.  [sources: Chess Life, Dec 1985, p. 10, Gilberg, The Fifth American Chess Congress, 1881, pp. 149-151, and Chicago Tribune, Mar 7, 1880, p. 3]

 

In 1891, William Steinitz (1836-1900) was arrested by the New York police as a Russian spy after someone in the telegraph company thought that his chess moves being sent over telegraph was code.  He was held for 24 hours and released.  At the time, Steinitz was playing Chigorin in Havana by cable.

 

In 1895, the Hastings International Chess Tournament was played.  Any chess player an hour late had their game forfeited as a penalty.  During adjourned games, any player caught with someone else analyzing their adjourned game would have any prize they might have won forfeited, and  expelled from the tournament.  Any player not playing up to his full strength would be expelled from the event.  [source: The Leeds Mercury, May 28, 1895, p. 19]

 

In early 1900, Steinitz was released from a sanitarium.  In April, 1900, he was arrested in New York for insanity and was again committed to an asylum.  [source: St. Albans Daily Messenger (Vermont), April 26, 1900, p. 1]   Steinitz died on August 12, 1900 of a heart attack in the Manhattan State Hospital (Wards Island).

 

In 1907 and earlier, no native of Strobeck, Germany (a chess-playing town since 1011) was allowed to marry a girl from any of the neighboring villages if she was not a chess player, under penalty of a heavy fine.  [source: The Philadelphia Inquirer, May 5, 1907, p. 58]

 

In 1916, German chess players in America were accused of spying by sending code used by chess clubs in postal chess.  Mail was censored between chess clubs in the USA and Canada.  [source: “Spies Using Chess Claim,” St. Joseph News (St. Joseph, MO), May 15, 1916, p. 8]

 

In 1927, Emanuel Lasker was penalized by the organizers of the 1927 New York International and not allowed to participate in the event.  Lasker accused the same organizers of the 1924 New York International chess tournament of brutality against him, crooked timing of moves on the chess clocks, and palming of gate receipts in the tournament.  Lasker expected some of the money from the gate receipts.  The New York tournament committee denied all charges.  [source: "Chess Scandal," Simpson's Leader-Times (Kittanning, PA), Feb 3, 1927, p. 4]

 

In 1927, Efim Bogolubov (1889-1952), chess champion of the Soviet Union, was banned and excommunicated by the chess section of the All-Union Soviet of Physical Culture.  The reason for his penalty was that he "exhibited the typically bourgeois vice of putting his pocket book above his principles."  He was expelled when he expressed the desire to give up his Soviet citizenship in order to play chess in other countries.  [source: The Bridgeport Telegram (Connecticut), Jan 21, 1927, p. 8]

 

In July 1933, all Jews were banned from the Greater German Chess Association.  The penalty was arrest.

 

In 1937, 13 chess players were arrested as punishment for talking Socialistic politics in between moves at a chess club in Nazi-governed Danzig.  The police charged the chess players with trying to keep alive the forbidden Social Democratic Party.  [source: Herald and Review (Decatur, Illinois), Feb 13, 1937, p. 3]

 

In 1940, German Nazis arrested all the Jewish chess players that were meeting at the Kwiencinski Chess Café in Warsaw.  The Germans had banned Jews from playing chess there.   The Jews were all taken to a concentration camp and were later killed in a mass execution.   Those killed included Polish masters Dawid Przepiorka, Achilles Frydmann, Stanislaw Kohn, and Moishe Lowtzky.  [source: Chess Review, Jan 1942, p. 17]

 

In 1942, during the U.S. chess championship in New York, Samuel Reshevsky was playing Arnold Denker when Reshevky’s flag fell.  The tournament director (Walter Stephens), who was standing behind the clock, flipped it around and, looking at Reshevsky’s side of the clock (which he mistakenly thought was Denker’s), announce “Denker forfeits!”  He refused to correct his error.  This erroneous ruling by the director allowed Reshevsky to tie for first with Isaac Kashdan.  Reshevsky then won the playoff match against Kashdan 6 months later.

 

In 1943, Humphrey Bogart (1899-1957) played correspondence chess with military members overseas until the FBI visited him.  The FBI thought that the chess moves were secret codes being sent abroad.  The US and Canadian censors began targeting postal chess games out of fear that the games were being used to send secret messages to enemy forces.  [source: Oberhaus, "The Spy Who Checkmated Me: Why Postal Chess Was Banned During Wartime." vice.com, Mar 25, 2017]

 

In March 1944, chess was banned by trans-Atlantic mail.  It was explained this was done to prevent enemy agents from employing such mediums to get code messages across the Atlantic.  (source: The Troy Record, March 31, 1944)  Censors searched letters for discussions of chess because enemies would often hide codes in chess symbols and moves. [source: Freedom of Press and National Security in Four Wars, D. Smyth, 2007]

 

After World War II, Alexander Alekhine was not invited to any chess tournaments.  He was accused of converting to Nazi racial doctrines and accused of actively collaborating with the enemy.  He claimed that the Nazi articles under his name were rewritten by the Germans.

 

In 1946, players in Australian chess competitions who failed to honor their chess match obligations were fined or debarred from future contests.  The penalties also applied to chess clubs which default their matches.  [source: Sydney Morning Herald, Feb 11, 1946, p. 6]

 

In 1954, the Argentine Chess Federation called off its national chess tournament in Buenos Aires after one of its invited chess players, Pedro Martin (1931-1973), punched one of the tournament directors.  Martin was banned from Argentine tournament for one year.  Twelve other chess masters joined Martin in a protest over the judging, so the national championship was cancelled.  [sources: New York Times, Dec 1, 1954, p. 45 and Chess Review, Dec 1954, p. 358]

 

In 1955, Norman Tweed Whitaker (1890-1975) was banned from chess tournaments sponsored by the US Chess Federation (USCF), due to his shady past.   Whitaker sued the USCF and the ban was revoked.

 

In 1961, Bobby Fischer was playing a match in Los Angeles with Samuel Reshevsky, sponsored by Jacqueline Piatigorsky.  She asked Fischer to rearrange his schedule and play his match earlier so that she could attend the match and her husband’s concert that evening.  Fischer refused to play earlier and was forfeited.

 

In 1962, FIDE introduced a rule against draws by agreement in fewer than 30 moves.  FIDE had the intention of enforcing this rule and the penalty was a loss of the game by both players.  The rule was dropped in 1964.

 

In 1967, the organizers of the Sousse Interzonal forfeited Bobby Fischer one of his games when Fischer requested that several of his games be rescheduled due to conflicts with starting times and his observance of a Sabbath that ran from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday.    The organizers had him scheduled to play Aivar Gipslis at 4 pm on Saturday.  After an hour of no show, his game was forefeited.  Fischer returned to play the next day, but was later forfeited again for not showing up.  The organizers finally dropped him from the tournament.

 

In 1969, GM Ludek Pachman (1924-2003) of Czechoslovakia was punished for his political activities.  He was arrested and imprisoned for over 2 years.  When he was released from prison in December 1970, he was banned from chess in Czechoslovakia.  In 1972, he moved to Germany so he could play chess.

 

In 1971, when Mark Taimanov (1926- ) returned to the USSR after losing to Bobby Fischer 6-0, he was banned from playing outside the country for several years and was stripped of his title ‘Honored Master of Sport.’  He was a concert pianist and was not allowed to give any more performances.  He was also banned from writing any articles and was deprived of his monthly stipend.

 

In August 1971, Trevor Stowe, a London chess dealer and owner of The Chess Centre, was arrested and charged in court for indecent exhibition on display in his shop window.  He was displaying 32 chess pieces which showed couples in sexual positions.  Stowe was fined $132, including court costs.  [source: The San Mateo Times, Aug 5, 1971, p. 8]

 

In July 1972, Bobby Fischer forefeited his 2nd game after failing to appear at the playing hall against Boris Spassky.  He was now down 2-0.  Fischer objected to the presence of cameras, though he could neither see them nor hear them.

 

In 1972, at the World Student Team championship in Graz, Austria, German Grandmaster Robert Huebner was playing American Ken Rogoff.  Huebner did not want to play the round so that he could rest as he still had several adjourned games to play.  So he played 1.c4 and offered Rogoff a draw after the first move.  Rogoff accepted.  Both players signed their score sheets and presented them to the tournament director, who refused to accept a one move draw.  So the players went back to the board and played a game where they sacrificed all their pieces, leaving just kings.  Again they signed their score sheets and handed them in to the T.D.  The matter then went to the tournament committee, which threatened to declare a double forfeit unless the players apologized and sat down to play a real game.  Rogoff agreed, but Huebner refused to comply and was forfeited.  The Russians wanted a double-forfeit, but Huebner insisted that he alone bore the penalty.

 

In 1973, a tournament director in Cleveland was arrested for organizing a chess tournament.  Police confiscated the chess sets on charges of allowing gambling (cash prizes to winners) and possession of gambling devices (the chess sets).

 

In 1974, FIDE temporarily banned South Africa and Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) from the chess Olympiad in Nice, France, due to their apartheid practices.  The ban remained in effect until 1992.

 

On April 3, 1975, Bobby Fischer forfeited his world chess title to Anatoly Karpov because he did not like the FIDE conditions for the match.

 

At the 1976 World Open in New York, a stronger player used the identity of a weaker friend in one of the lower sections.  The stronger player was winning all his games until his identity was found out.  Director Bill Goichberg had a talk with the person who disappeared before the end of the tournament.

In 1977, South Africa was banned from FIDE events because of its continued apartheid practices.  The ban remained in effect until 1992.

 

In 1976, smoking was banned for USCF tournaments for the first time.  Refusal of a player to comply with the rule of non-smoking resulted in a penalty, up to and including forfeiture of the game or even disqualification of the player.

 

In January 1979, Patrick MeKenna killed Jack Noble in Nevada over an argument about a chess game in a Nevada prison.  After a penalty hearing, the jury returned a verdict of death.   [source: Pinnock, "10 Facts About the Most Dangerous Criminal In Nevada - Patrick McKenna," ranker.com, Jan 17, 2020]

 

In 1979, Viktor Korchnoi played Anatoly Karpov for the world championship.  Korchnoi accused Soviet players of cheating, of ganging up on Westerners in tournaments, and throwing key games when necessary.  For punishment, the Soviets arrested Korchnoi’s son in 1970 as a “draft dodger.”  The Soviets tried to put as much stress on Korchnoi as possible.

 

In 1982 , Ken Thompson (1943- ) traveled to Moscow for a computer chess tournament and thought his computer, BELLE (PDP-11/23), was traveling with him on the airplane in a crate. However, the U.S. Customs Service confiscated the chess computer at Kennedy Airport as part of Operation Exodus, a program to prevent illegal export of high technology items to the Soviets. It took over a month and a penalty of a $600 fine to retrieve BELLE from customs.

 

In 1983, Anna Akhsharumova was playing the final round of the Soviet Women’s Chess championship against her main competitor, Nana Ioseliani.  Anna won the game on time forfeit and should have won the title.  But the next day, Ioseliani filed a protest alleging a malfunction in the chess clock.  Ioseliani demanded a new game be played.  Anna refused to play, so the result of her game with Ioseliani was reversed by the All-Union Board of Referees in Moscow (the tournament itself was being played in Tallinn), thereby forfeiting her title.  Anna went from 1st place to 3rd place over this decision.

 

In 1985, Nick Down, a former British Junior Correspondence champion, entered the British Ladies Correspondence Championship as Miss Leigh Strange and won the event (and 15 British pounds along with the Lady Herbert trophy).  He then signed up to represent Britain in the Ladies Postal Olympiad.  He was later caught when one of his friends mouthed off about it and Nick confessed.  The whole thing had been cooked up by Nick Down and a group of undergraduates at Cambridge, where Nick was a student.  Nick returned the Lady Herbert trophy and was banned from the British Correspondence Chess Association for two years.

 

In 1985, Josif Dorfman was shadowed an blackmailed as a penalty for not spying for the Karpov camp against the Kasparov camp, in which he was a second.  His family got death threats.  [source: Evans, “Writer documents Russian Chess Scandal,” Sun Sentinel (Florida), Nov 21, 1993]

 

In 1986, Israel was banned from the chess Olympiad, held in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates (UAE).  The UAE refused to grant entry permits because Israel and the UAE were still in a state of conflict.

 

In 1987, Grandmaster Miguel Quinteros (1947- ) of Argentina was suspended from FIDE events for three years for violating the FIDE ban on South Africa twice.  He played a 6-game exhibition match in Johnnesburg in 1988.  Other players banned because they played chess in South Africa included Ludek Pachman (1924-2003), Karl Robatsch (1929-2000), who was banned for one year, and Hans Kestler (1939- ).

 

In 1987, Spanish writer and International Master Dr. Ricardo Calvo (1943-2002) was condemned by FIDE and declared Persona non Grata (an unwelcome person) by a vote of 71 to 1.  The penalty was imposed for his racial attack on Latin Americans in a chess magazine.  He admitted that he violated election ethics by offering free Kasparov simultaneous exhibitions to certain countries in exchange for their voting for Mr Lucena for FIDE president (Campomanes’ opponent) in the recent FIDE elections.  He also erroneously charged that a Latin American woman was beaten up by supporters of FIDE President Campomanes.

 

In 1988, at the Saint John International, GM Kamran Shirazi was forfeited while he pondered his next move.  An arbiter reminded him of his obligation to record the moves of the game when not in time pressure.  Shirazi forgot to write down the last move and a half.  Under FIDE rules, players must keep score unless under dire time pressure.  Shirazi had ½ hour on his clock.  Shirazi was reminded again, and he balked, arguing he would think first and write later.  The arbiter then deducted 5 minutes from Shirazi’s clock.  Shirazi then stormed over to another arbiter for second opinion.  By now, he was forfeited and the appeals committee upheld the arbiter’s decision to remind Shirazi and deducting 5 minutes from his clock.

 

In 1988, undercover police arrested a chess player at a park in New York City after he won a marked $5 bill against a cop posing as a construction worker during a blitz game.  The chess player was jailed for 3 days, his medication was confiscated, and he had a heart attack.  The arrest was finally tossed out by a judge.  Five years later, the city settled the wrongful arrest lawsuit out of court for $100,000.

 

In 1989, during the French championship, IM Gilles Andruet(1958-1995) and IM Jean-Luc Seret got into a fight over an argument whether Andruet resigned before Seret checkmated him. After the fight, Andruet needed 8 stitches and had to withdraw from the tournament, despite the fact that he was in the lead after 10 of 14 rounds. [source: “The Brutal Murder of International Master Gilles Andruet,” Tartajubow On Chess II, January 18, 2018]

 

In 1989, the police raided a chess tournament in Los Angeles.  The L.A.P.D. vice officers raided a nightly chess tournament held at Dad’s Donuts.  They cited three men for gambling after finding $1.50 on the table.  The police staged the raid after an undercover detective tried unsuccessfully to join a blitz chess game.  The detective then pulled out his badge and said “all of you are under arrest,” as the L.A.P.D. swooped in.

 

In the 1980s, Jaan Ehlvest (1962- ) of Estonia was once banned from playing chess by the Estonian Sports Committee after a drinking incident in Tallinn.

 

In the 1990s, life prisoner Claude Bloodgood (1937-2001) organized chess games in his prison in Virginia, playing fellow inmates.    He rigged the ratings of the players, and then beat all these top players in match after match over the years.  By 1996 he had a rating of 2702, the second-highest rated player in the USA.  The U.S. Chess Federation changed its rating system to prevent “closed pool” rating inflation.

 

In 1991, Arkady Flom, a 64-year-old grandfather was arrested in Manhattan after a young man sat down to play chess with him in the park.  The young man played so poorly that Flom would give him pointers in exchange for $2.  The young man agreed.  They played for 20 more minutes and the young fellow paid his money.  As soon as Flom put the money in his pocket, four NYPD officers approached him, slapped him in handcuffs and read him his rights.  He was arrested for promoting gambling in the second degree and for possession of a gambling device, his chess set.  He later received a $100,000 settlement in a false arrest suit against New York City as the judge ruled that a chess game was not  “gambling” since it was a game of skill rather than chance and the chess board was not “gambling equipment.”

 

In 1992, Grandmaster and former world junior champion Pablo Zarnicki of Argentina was disqualified from a Dos Hermanas Internet Chess Club tournament, accused of cheating by using a computer, which he denied.

 

In 1992, police in New Rochelle, NY, arrested a Louis Taylor, age 41, in a library for playing chess.  Taylor was asked to put away is chess board and pieces.  He was reading a chess book and was following the games with his own set.  A librarian told him to put his game away, and when he refused, the police ware called and arrested him.  The cuffed Taylor and charged him with trespassing.

 

In 1992, Bobby Fischer was threatened with a fine and arrest for playing chess in Yugoslavia.  Playing chess in Yugoslavia violated George W.W. Bush’s Executive Order 12810 that implemented sanctions engaging in economic activities in Yugoslavia.  Following the match, the US Department of Treasury obtained an arrest warrant against him.  Fischer never returned to the United States for the rest of his life.

 

In 1993, chess was banned from American River College in California because of disruptive behavior on people playing in the cafeteria and library.  Campus police ordered some chess players to stop playing chess.  The players refused and the campus police confiscated the chess board and pieces.

 

In 1993, Tim Trogdon was playing in a chess tournament in San Antonio, Texas.  After the end of the first day, he got so mad at the tournament director for poor pairings and bad tournament conditions at the hotel, which he tore down and ripped up the pairing sheets that were posted for the next day.  The police were called and he was arrested.  I bailed him out.

 

In July 1993, an unrated African-American player named John von Neumann (the name of a famous computer science pioneer) was accused of cheating in the Open section of the World Open after defeating a 2350-rated player and drawing his game with a grandmaster.  The player wore headphones and seemed to have a suspicious bulge in one of his pockets, which appeared to be making noises at important points of the game.  When he was quizzed by Bill Goichberg, the tournament director, he was unable to demonstrate very much knowledge in some simple chess concepts.  He was accused of using a chess computer and cheating, so was disqualified.  He was never seen again.

 

In 1993, FIDE forfeited Gary Kasparov and Nigel Short as world champion and challenger as they organized their own chess association, the Professional Chess Association.  Both players were ejected from FIDE and their ratings no longer appeared in the FIDE rating list.

 

In 1994, chess was banned in Afghanistan by Taliban edicts.  Anyone caught playing chess were beaten or imprisoned.  Chess was banned from 1994 through 2001.

 

In 1996, during a Karpov-Kamsky match in Elista, Russia, Kata Kamsky and his father, Rustam, were fined $2,000 each over Rustam’s claim that Vasyikov and another international master, Vasily Gagarin, were providing illegal extra help to Anatoly Karpov by feeding him game analysis.  The Kamskys were ordered to write letters of apology to Karpov and the two observers after failing to backup the accusation.  When they refuse, the appeals committee fined them.

 

In March 1997, 13-year-old John Slack was beat up and sent to a hospital in critical condition.  He was  beaten up by his 15-year-old chess opponent, Joshua Simms, during a Junior High chess game, who had just lost a chess game.  Simms was arrested on an assault charge and suspended from school for 5 days. [sources: Fight over chess game leaves 13-year-old in coma,” AP News, March 19, 1997 and “Fight Over Junior High Chess Game Leaves Boy in Coma; Opponent Arrested,” spokesman.com, March 20, 1997]

 

In 1998, an unknown 55-year-old chess player, Clemens Allwermann of Germany won the Boeb;ingen Open ahead of IMs and GMs.  He score 7.5 out of 9 without a single loss.  He was accused of cheating using the Fritz engine but it was inconclusive as to the evidence.  The Bavarian Chess Federation barred him from participating in future chess tournaments.

 

In 1999, at the Bobingen Open, a German club player Clemens Allwermann used an earpiece linked to Fritz to win all his games.  He was subsequently exposed and returned his prize money.

 

In 1999, world woman champion Susan Polgar refused to accept the match conditions between her and Xie Jun, and forfeited her title.  She did not want to play the world championship match in China.

 

In 2001, the Oregon Department of Prisons prohibited chess books and magazines in the prisons because it “contained code throughout.”  

 

In 2001, Grandmaster Alexandru Crisan was accused of faking his Elo rating of 2635 (number 33 in the world) by fixing chess matches for his own benefit and falsifying chess tournament results.

 

In 2002, at the Lamperthein Open tournament, a player was suspected of cheating.  He was found in the bathroom using a handheld computer which displayed a running chess program.  When confronted by the tournament director, he claimed that he was only checking his email.  When he was asked to show the computer to the T.D., he refused.  He was then immediately disqualified from the tournament.

 

In 2002, at the World Open in Philadelphia, a Russian player was caught going outside and getting advice from another player.  His opponent followed the Russian player outside and caught him speaking in Russian to the same man intently watching the game.  They had been discussing the last move of the game, which was heard by 30-40 onlookers.  The Russian then said he would forfeit the game. 

 

In 2002, two players got into a fight at the World Open in Philadelphia when one of the players threw a basketball at another player between rounds.  World Open organizer Bill Goichberg penalized and expelled Akeem Gregory-Thompson when Akeem punched Hikaru Nakamura in the jaw.  [source: The Chess Drum, July 10, 2002]

 

In 2003, a player was caught in the bathroom using a handheld PC with a chess program on it.  He was disqualified and the tournament director asked his chess federation to ban the player in other tournaments.

 

In 2003, an inmate in Utah was prohibited from subscribing to a chess magazine because he was under “intensive management.”

 

In October 2003, Grandmaster Ruslan Ponomariov and former world champion became the first GM to forfeit a chess game because of his mobile phone.  It rang during his game in round 1 of the European Team Championship in Bulgaria.  He lost his game to Evgeny Agrest (who lost a game in 2004 when his cell phone rang) in his Ukrainian team match versus Sweden.  

 

In 2004, FIDE vice-president Zurub Azmaiparashvili was arrested by a group of security men during the final ceremonies of the 36th chess Olympiad in Calvia, Spain.  He was approaching the stage to get attention of FIDE President Ilyumzhinov for some chess awards that had not been given out.  The security people stepped in front of him.  The Calvia police said that Zurub hit one of the security agents, so they arrested him.

 

In 2004, top seed Christine Castellano was playing in the Philippine Women’s National Chess Championship when her cell phone rang.  She was disqualified from the event.

 

In 2005, Grandmaster Mato Damjanovic was banned from tournament play for one year for pretending to play in a chess tournament (Kali Cup) which did not exist.

 

In 2005, at the HB Global Chess Challenge tournament in Minneapolis, a player was caught repeatedly talking on his cell phone during his game.  Published rules for that event prohibited the use of cell phones during the tournament.  The tournament director suspected that he was receiving moves over the phone from some accomplice.  His results were expunged from the tournament and an ethics complaint was lodged.

 

In September 2005, chess master Robert Snyder was arrested in Fort Collins, Colorado on charges of molesting his chess students.  He later escaped, but US Marshals tracked him and arrested him in Belize in 2009.

 

In 2006, a chess master resigned from the U.S. Chess Federation executive board after being accused of ethics violations.  He was accused of fabricating or manipulating chess tournament results to keep his master’s rating by playing repeated games within a closed group of friends that either did not exist or never played chess anywhere else.

 

In 2006, during a tournament at Subroto Park, Umakant Sharma was caught receiving instructions from an accomplice using a chess computer via a Bluetooth-enabled device embedded in his cap.  He was banned from playing competitive chess for 10 years.

 

In 2006, at the World Open in Philadelphia, Steve Rosenberg  was leading before the final round in one of the sections.  He was playing for $18,000 if he won his last round.  But he was caught using a wireless transmitter and receiver in his ear (Rosenberg claimed it was a hearing aid) and was disqualified from the event.

 

In 2006, Vladimir Kramnik was forfeited his 5th game of the match against Veselin Topalov in the world championship match.  Kramnik arrived for the game and discovered that his bathroom was locked.  He staged a sit-in and after an hour, FIDE forfeited the game to Toplaov.  Topalov had earlier filed a written protest with the organizers charging that Kramnik was going to his private bathroom too many times during the games.  The insinuation was that Kramnik might be cheating by consulting a computer while in the bathroom, the only room with no cameras.

 

In 2006-2007, many forged email posts were made on the Internet targeting several U.S. Chess Federation members and candidates in the upcoming USCF election.    The fake identities were alleged to come from Susan Polgar, former world women’s chess champion and a board member of the USCF, and her husband, Paul Truong.  In 2009, both were removed from the executive board of the USCF.  Their webmaster, Gregory Alexander, was indicted by a federal grand jury on 34 counts of email hacking and one count of aggravated identity theft.

 

In April 2007, Garry Kasparov was arrested for being at an anti-Kremlin rally is Moscow.  His penalty was a $40 fine.  [source: BBC News, April 14, 2007]

 

In 2007, a team of home-schooled students who won the 2006 Arizona Scholastic Championship was banned from the 2007 championship.   Rules were changed to not allow home-schooled students from participating.  Only public and private schools were allowed to participate in the event.

 

In 2007, during a Dutch League match, the team captain of one of the teams was caught using a PDA.  The player had walked outside the playing room, with permission, to get some fresh air.  An arbiter followed him and caught him using Pocket Fritz.  The player was banned from playing in the Dutch league for two years.

 

In 2007, Krzysztof Ejsmont of Poland was expelled from the Tadeusz Gniot Memorial tournament after 7 rounds for “unsportive play.”  He was accused of using a chess program to make his moves.

 

In January 2008, GM Ben Finegold won his game at the Mid America Open chess tournament when his opponent’s cell phone went off during their game.

 

In 2008, Ivan Cheparinov forfeited his game at Wijk aan Zee for not shaking hands with his opponent, Nigel Short.

 

In 2008, at the Dubai Open, M. Sadatnajafi was caught receiving suggested moves by text message on his mobile phone.  He was disqualified from the tournament.

 

In September 2008, Nigel Short was penalized because his cell phone went off.  Short (2655) was forfeited from his game against Ketevan Arakhamia-Grant (2448) after 26 moves.  Short actually turned off his cell phone, but there was a ring tone that went off when the phone had a low batter.  The phone played a theme to remind the owner to charge it. 

 

In 2008, GM Vassily Ivanchuk was supposed to have been penalized for missing a drug test at the Dresden chess Olympiad after the final round.  Due to a procedural error, an official Doping Control Officer was not present, he was not penalized.  The penalty would have been a two-year ban from all FIDE chess tournaments.  Ivanchuk declined to provide a urine sample after losing the last round to GM Gata Kamsky, saying it was an insult to his intelligence and honor.   Ivanchuk then stormed out of the room in the conference center, kicked a concrete pillar in the lobby, pounded a countertop in the cafeteria with his fists and then vanished into the coatroom.

 

In 2009, during the Australian Norths Chess Club Century Year chess tournament , a 14-year-old boy was caught using a hand-held chess computer in the bathroom.  The boy was expelled from the tournament and banned for 2 years by the Australian Chess Federation.

 

In September 2009, Grandmaster Vladislav Tkachiev was playing in the Kolkata Open.  He appeared for his round 3 games in an intoxicated state, fell asleep at the board and forfeited his game.

 

In 2009, in a match between Bulgaria and England, the Bulgarian Grandmaster Alexander Delchev’s cell phone went off, leading to an immediate forfeit of the game.

 

In July 2009, Gregory Alexander, an assistant to grandmaster Susan Polgar, was arrested in San Francisco for computer fraud and identity theft in stealing email messages between US Chess Federation (USCF) members.

 

In 2009, Indian Grandmaster G.N. Gopal was banned for one year in all India events for failing to appear in the National Championship.  The ban was later revoked.

 

In 2009, Grandmaster Susan Polgar and her husband, Paul Truong, were banned from the USCF after being accused of posting nasty remarks on the Internet in the name of another chess player.

 

In 2009, at the Aeroflot Open, GM Shakhriyar Mamedyarov of Azerbaijan, the top seed, lost quickly to Igor Kurnosov of Russia.  After the game, Mamedyarov accused his opponent of cheating, saying that his opponent went to the bathroom after every move, taking his coat with him.  Mamedyarov said he examined the game against the computer program Rybka, and that every move in the game matched the computer’s recommendations every time.  Kurnosov’s pockets were searched, and the organizers only found cigarettes, a lighter and a pen in his pockets.  After the protest, Mamedyarov withdrew from the tournament and Kurnosov was allowed to finish the tournament.

 

In January 2010, FIDE banned the Peruvian National Chess Team from all international competition because of a debt of 7,800 euros owed to FIDE as membership dues.

 

In October 2010, six chess players were arrested and fined $50 for playing chess in Inwood Hill Park in Manhattan.  They were playing on stone chess tables with a sign nearby saying that the chess tables were off limits to adults unaccompanied by minors.  [source: ABC News, Dec 30, 2010]  The charges were finally dismissed in April, 2011.

 

In 2010, at the Khanty-Mansiysk chess Olympiad, three French players were caught in a scheme to use a computer program to decide moves.  IM Cyril Marzolo followed the tournament at home and used a computer program to decide the best moves.  He would then send the moves by SMS to another player, IM Arnaud Hauchard.  Hauchard would then signal to another player, GM Sebasstian Feller, to make a certain move.   Phone bill records were examined showing over 150 text messages to one player and another 30 text messages to the other player.   They were caught and Feller and Marzolo were give 5-year suspensions.  Hauchard was given a lifetime suspension.  The players were accused of cheating in two other tournaments in 2010, the Paris Open and the Bienne Open. 

 

At the 2010 chess Olympiad, the Yemeni team lost scored 0-4 after refusing to sit down across from the Israeli team.

 

In 2011, Rybka, the best chess-playing computer program in the world, was disqualified and banned for the plagiarizing of two other chess engines, Crafty and Fruit.  Its author, International Master Vasik Rajlich, was told to return all trophies and prize money back to the International Computer Games Association (IGCA), which governs the World Computer Chess Championships.  On June 29, 2011, after a 5-0 vote, Rybka was stripped of its titles, and Rajlich has now been banned for life in playing in computer chess championships.  The ICGA disqualified and banned Rybka and its programmer, Rajlich, from previous and future World Computer Chess Championships.  Rajlich has denied using other code, saying that Rybka is 100% original at the source code level.  Further allegations have been made that Rajlich violated the Gnu Public License (GPL ) based on a decompilation effort by chess programmer Zach Wegner. The ICGA demanded that Rajlich return the four replicas of the Shannon trophy (World Computer Championshop Trophy) and prize money of the World Computer Chess Championships of 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010.   [source: Tartar, "Scandal in the World of Computer Chess," New York Magazine, July 2011]

 

In 2011, during the German Chess Championship, FIDE master Christop Natsidis used a chess program on his smartphone.  He later admitted that he had cheated and was disqualified from the championship.

 

In 2011, FIDE suspended the Bangladesh Chess Federation following the unpaid dues of 35,000 Turkish dollars.  FIDE also removed all the rated chess players of Bangladesh from the FIDE website.  This was the second time that the Bangladesh Chess Federation was suspended for not paying their dues.

 

In 2011, Grandmaster Eshan Ghaem Maghami was disqualified from a chess tournament in Corsica after he refused to play his 4th round opponent, Israeli FIDE master Ehud Shachar.

 

In 2012, 6 players from Soviet Georgia were all forced to forfeit their games at the European championship.  They failed to arrive at the boards on time after setting their clocks wrong at Daylight Savings Time.

 

In 2012, Grandmaster Mamedyarov was forfeited his game at the European Chess Championship when he arrived at his board 10 seconds after the officially stated start time.  Later, he and his opponent were forfeited for agreeing to a draw in 19 moves.  Mamedyarov then immediately quit the tournament and left.

 

In 2012, a player, Clark Smiley, was caught using a chess engine (Fritz) on a PDA during the Virginia Scholastic and Collegiate Championships.  The player was disqualified from the tournament, had his membership to the Virginia Chess Federation (VCF) revoked, and had an ethics complaint filed to the USCF.  Smiley was given permission to use the PDA device to keep a digital record of each move using eNotate – but only for that purpose.  But he also had a chess engine installed on the device and was using that to make his moves.

 

In October 2012, a German grandmaster, Falko Bindrich, was suspected of cheating at the German Bundesliga team match by using an analysis program on his smartphone.  He refused to be searched or turn over his smartphone, whereupon his game was declared lost.  Bindrich claimed that there was private and corporate confidential information on his phone.  The German Chess Federation issued a 2-year suspension on Bindrich.

 

In 2012, GM Suat Atalik of Turkey was given a 15-month ban from international play by the Turkish Chess Federation.  The ban was a result of his refusal to sign a Turkish Chess Federation document stating that he is responsible for all financial consequences of his participation in chess tournaments abroad.  Further, that he will “act in accordance with the responsibilities of a national athlete” and won’t commit “any activity against the Turkish Republic.”

 

In 2013, Loris Cereda, a former mayor of Buccinasco, near Milan, was found guilty of cheating at chess and was banned from the Italian Chess Federation.  He was caught using dark glasses that had been fitted with a hidden micro camera.  The glasses sent live images of his opponent’s moves to a chess computer that then dictated through a secret earpiece the strongest response. 

 

In 2014, chess master Wesley Vermeulen of the Netherlands was caught cheating in chess by consulting a mobile phone in the bathroom.  He penalty was banishment for on year in Ductch and FIDE chess tournaments.

 

In April 2015, Georgian GM Gaioz Nigalidze was caught cheating when tournament officials discovered him consulting a smartphone with chess software in the bathroom during a game being played in the Dubai Open.  He penalty was being stripped of his grandmaster title and banned from FIDE chess events for 3 years. 

 

In February 2016, Russian master Sergey Asianov was caught cheating by using a smartphone in the toilet at the Moscow Open.  His penalty was being expelled from the tournament and suspended for one year.

 

In 2017, a Malaysian 12-year-old girl was wearing s striped dress that was considered seductive by one of the tournament organizers.  As punishment, she was forced to drop out of the tournament.  [sources: Daily Mail (UK), April 28, 2017 and Long, "Chess Scandal over dress code in Malaysia," ChessBase News, May 4, 2017]

 

In September 2017, Canadian GM Anton Kovayov was penalized for wearing shorts.  Kovalyov was playing in the Chess World Cup in Tbilisi, Georgia.  Shortly before the 3rd round, the arbiter told him to change from shorts that he was wearing to long pants.  The two exchanged words and Kovalyov ended up forfeiting his game and leaving the tournament.  [source: "Dress Code Incident At World Cup: Kovalyov Forfeits," chess.com, Sep 10, 2017]

 

In July 2019, GM Igors Rausis was caught cheating in the Strasbourg Open chess tournament, using a mobile phone in the bathroom.  He penalty was the loss of his GM title.  He later retired from competitive chess.  [sources: The Guardian, July 13, 2019 and Reid, "Disgraced grandmaster embroiled in ugly new chess controversy," Yahoo Sport, Oct 12, 2020]

 

In April 2020, chess players and observers were each slapped with a $2,000 fine as a penalty for refusing to break up a chess game in a public housing area.  The Hong Kong government banned public gatherings of more than 4 people to help prevent COVID-19’s spread.  [source: South China Morning Post, April 6, 2020]

 

In April 2020, 17 elderly people were arrested at a chess club in Serbia.  People over 65 were banned from going out of their homes.  Concerned neighbors called the police and the chess players were arrested.

 

In August 2020, the Polish Chess Federation banned 17-year-old Woman FIDE Master (WFM) Patrycja Waszczuk for 2 years for using a phone during her chess play.  [source: chess24.com, Oct 29, 2020]

 

In October 2020, Armenian GM Tigran Petrosian was accused of using a chess computer in the finals of the chess.com Pro Chess League.  He was banned for life from playing on the chess.com server.  [source: "Cheating controversy at Pro Chess League," ChessBase News, Oct 5, 2020]

 

In 2020, 9 grandmasters and 50 titled chess players (national masters and above) were caught cheating at chess.com.  The penalty and punishment was a permanent ban from chess.com.