An Atlantic City casino is suing 14 gamblers who raked in more than $1.5 million in winnings after realizing that eight decks of cards had not been preshuffled and kept producing the same sequence of cards, over and over.

The gamblers kept raising their bets -- from $10 a hand to $5,000 -- and scored 41 consecutive winning hands of baccarat in April, the Associated Press reports.

As the payouts mounted, Golden Nugget Atlantic City flooded the area with security teams, convinced that someone was cheating, but were unable to figure out how.

In the end, the casino let nine of the gamblers cash out $558,900. The rest still have $977,800 in chips.

In its lawsuit, the casino cites state gambling regulations requiring all casino games to offer fair odds — to both sides.

The casino's lawsuit argues that the gamblers and the casino both began the game believing it was legal and proper — until the players kept winning repeatedly.

Benjamin Dash, a lawyer for the gamblers, counters that his clients did nothing wrong and deserve to be paid.

"The Golden Nugget appealed to gamblers to come in and play games licensed and sanctioned by the state of New Jersey," he says. "My clients did exactly that, and then were denied their winnings. There is absolutely no law in New Jersey that would permit the Golden Nugget to declare the game illegal because it failed to provide shuffled cards."

The casino also asserts in its lawsuit that Gemaco Inc., a Missouri playing card manufacturer, acknowledged it had provided a defective shipment of cards that were not preshuffled.

A message left at the company's administrative offices was not immediately returned Monday, the AP says.