Pokerroom Raids and Players' Money

[Gandor]

As the BW raid thread was getting long, I felt this needed a new thread so a discussion could be made. While IANAL, I believe we as players have a problem when it comes to these raids and our money.

Under the current arrangement with the various rooms in NYC, we as players have no legal ownership to our money while we play our games. We happily give our money to the house in exchange for house currency to use until we call it a night. The problem is, when a raid occurs, the poker room has possession and ownership of our money. At this point all we have are gambling devices which are further evidence of illegal activity.

Is there a way to arrange things such that our money remains legally in our ownership during the course of play? Could escrow laws or some form of contract preserve our ownership status of the money?