Dealer Error - Exposed Card or Player Error - Flashed Card?

I've read and read and what I would think would be an easy answer seems to be a matter of interpretation. In a Hold 'Em Tournament home game the dealer (who is playing) is dealing the cards when one card being dealt is exposed by the player when he moves his hand forward to grab the card prematurely. It is obvious to all that the card would not have been exposed at all had that player not placed his hand in the way to grab the card before it stopped and the complete hand dealt. It ONLY became exposed because of the player moving his hand (the body part) into the table play area. The player is not on a blind and it is the second card. Is this a case of a "dealer error" and the card is not given to the player or is this a "flashed" card and he receives it while everyone knows what it is? My inclination is that it is the PLAYER'S fault so he is stuck with that card. Any "official" references????

Oz will probably correct me on this one, but usually if you expose a card your hand is declared dead.

Why you would want to play with a hand that the full table knows ?

In a case like this, it is the player's error, but in most cases if the dealer sees the card it is assumed that all have seen it, he takes the card and says, "7 of clubs exposed," for example, then simply deals the player another card after he has completed the rotation.

In our home games, and forgive me if this is way wrong, the exposed card before the completion of the deal is shown to the table and is considered the first burn card before the flop. The deal then continues as normal.

Haven't got Roberts Rules on me but you've got it, it hinges on whether it was a player or dealer fault. If dealer the card becomes the first burn card and the player gets a new card at the end of the deal. If the player is at fault they have to play the card, the hand isn't dead but they may be subject to a penalty AFTER the hand.

In this case I'd be inclined to call it dealer error - yes it hit the player's hand and if he hadn't moved the card doesn't get exposed but at the same time he can't know where the dealer is going to pitch to.

"he can't know where the dealer is going to pitch to."
But in this case he DID know where it was going to be pitched. This wasn't simply the dealer hitting the player's hand with the card and it then flipping, the player moved his hand TO the card as it was about to hit the felt more or less in an effort to grab it. The player proved to not be an "Ozzie Smith" of the card felt and because his hand hit into the moving card it flipped over. No doubt had he kept his hand back the card would have lieterally landed on top of the first hole card in the perfect spot, hence my thought that it was the player's own fault the card ws exposed - or flashed, and he should keep it.

Your core group needs to decide on how to handle similiar future events. The first infraction (imho) should just be to declare the card dead and make it the first burn rather than turning it into a big federal case, thereby keeping the players comfortable and happy so they come back with their wallets.

just call it a dead card... and move on. Tell everyone to keep there hands away while the cards are being dealt. How much punishment do you want the guy to have?

You're assuming an awful lot of skill on the part of your dealers - FWIW I know some very good professional ones and even they won't hit the exact same spot every time every hand. Even though this particular card may have been about to land perfectly the player couldn't have known that and most of the time the dealer couldn't have either.

I just can't see how you can lay blame on the player for this unless it's something he's doing on a regular basis.

Plus we have to look at the spirit of the rules as well. Even before we get to the exposed card rules, rule #1 of Roberts Rules of Poker is this:

1. Management reserves the right to make decisions in the spirit of fairness, even if a strict interpretation of the rules may indicate a different ruling.

So even if you do think the player was at fault do you really think it was deliberate and malicious? I don't see how it could be since he can't know what the card is at the time he exposes it. For all he knows it could have been a good card for him. It's not like he saw the card, didn't like it then deliberately turned it up hoping to get a new one. That second situation is the kind of thing the player-exposed rules are meant to deter. And if it's not deliberate and malicious, is it really fair to be invoking a rule that basically says the player has to play that hand face up?

Putting this on the player, especially if it's a once-off, is being the worst kind of rules nit IMO.

Definitely sounds like player error to me, but, as said above, it wasn't done intentionally. To prevent it from happening you can just lay down the ground rules next game that if a player interferes with a card's trajectory causing it to become exposed he has to play the hand anyway. Then you can always invoke rule #1 above: "Management reserves the right to make decisions in the spirit of fairness, even if a strict interpretation of the rules may indicate a different ruling" on a case by case basis.

This.

We do the same.

Why not yell at the player to make sure they don't do it again? Everyone is eager to see what their two cards are but it's best to wait until everyone else looks at their cards before you do.