[MrMonkey]

Even in a friendly game, the deck is always above the table and should always be cut. If somebody forgets to cut the deck INSIST that it be cut. Very few people find this offensive because for experienced card players, passing the deck to the right to be cut, and then having it cut, is part of the ritual of playing cards. (I grew up playing lots of card games, so when I shuffle a deck I put it on my right to be cut without thinking, and when I see a deck sitting to my left I cut it without thinking). I'm guessing some players are even superstituous about cutting the deck, since that is the final determination of who will get dealt which cards and the deck is set for the hand after that.

I agree, 100% chance he is cheating. I have actually been through this twice in my 0.25/0.50 nl poker group at school in the last two years with two different people. One of them was sloppy and just handling the cards under the table like your roommate, although the other one, who is pretty clever, had actually invented some semi-sophisticated trick shuffles and cuts of his own and was a decent mechanic. It took a very long time for anybody to catch on.

Anyway, I have some advice for how to confront him. First of all, confronting him alone is best in my opinion. Don't take any 'I don't know what you're talking about' bs from him, he's obviously cheating and you can enumerate hands and descripe his deck handling methods and eventually he won't be able to deny it anymore.

The most difficult thing is figuring out where to go from there. My poker group in college was also a group of friends to a certain extent, often doing non-poker related things together. What myself and a few friends 'in the know' did against the two different cheaters was allow them to keep playing in games and just keep an eye on them. After having been caught it's unlikely he'll try it again anyway.

I'm sure people will disagree with me on this, but I don't recommend letting anybody else know who doesn't already know. I think this would only create more problems than it could solve. If you're pretty sure he won't cheat again I'd leave it at that. We infact had some threats of physical violence and intimidation in one instance when somebody found out about another player's cheating (of course, 0.25/0.50 nl being slightly higher stakes there were a few players who had lost a few hundred dollars to this player).