HARRAH'S VINDICTIVE AGGRESSION AGAINST PATRONS

[magoo]

If a single person gets arrested for Harrah's own negligence, all gamblers should boycott Harrah's for LIFE. Why prosecute those people? Harrah's won't take a loss on that money in ANY way. They will get that money (back) from the company that goofed up the machines or through tax write-offs. This article is misleading. Other reports mention, Harrah's granted permission for it's security tapes to be reviewed by the prosecutor's office. This potential prosecution of patrons is not coming solely from the prosecutor. Harrah's has to be pushing this thing.

July 19, 2007

Winners on faulty slot machine in Ind. may face charges

Associated Press

ELIZABETH, Ind. -- Prosecutors are considering criminal charges against casino gamblers who won big on a slot machine that had been installed with faulty software.

The machine at Caesars Indiana credited gamblers $10 for each dollar they inserted because the software wasn't designed for U.S. currency, state police said. More than two dozen people played the machine before one gambler alerted Caesars employees.

Caesars lost $487,000 on the machine during that time, state police said.

A decision on whether to bring criminal charges could come in a couple of weeks, said John Colin, chief deputy prosecutor for Harrison County. He said "criminal intent" may be involved when people play a machine they know is faulty.

The casino said some of the gamblers returned the money after the casino contacted them.

"This is a bit of an unusual case because you've got to go back and piece together who did what," Colin said. The prosecutor's office declined to say Thursday what criminal charges could be brought.

The incident occurred last July, but he said obtaining casino records took longer than expected.

Kathryn Ford of Louisville, Ky., the gambler who alerted the casino, said going after the other patrons was unfair.

When a slot machine jams and gamblers lose money, they don't get it back, she said.

"It doesn't work in the reverse," Ford said. "They need to forget it and move on."

[soulvamp]

Might not be a bad idea to switch to decaf.

[Legislurker]

Speaking from long experience in casinos, they probably suspect people they WANT prosecuted to be involved. Every now and then, slot machines goof up. Drop one coin, it plays 3, or a bill validator gives wrong denoms, etc... It used to be worse when machines actually took tokens or currency. Im not in the loop now, but I garuntee you every sizeable casino in this country has hustlers who come by every day looking for flaws in machines. Some travel casino to casino knowing what to look for, some are just locals who know a lil bit. If people started maliciously popping $100s in and cashing out knowing it was fraud, they deserve to be prosecuted. Especially if the fukctards were dumb enough to use their own player cards to take some free shots at a jackpot. A good broken machine can be worth 25k/week, depending on how fast they are on coin in/out, and soft count not being run by total tools. Some of these riverboats and indian casinos get robbed blind because they don't have modern surveillance, and security/surveillance employees make the lowest wages in house.

[*TT*]

[ QUOTE ]
This potential prosecution of patrons is not coming solely from the prosecutor. Harrah's has to be pushing this thing.

[/ QUOTE ]

I disagree. This is likely out of Harrah's hands.

[Bluegrass Poker]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
This potential prosecution of patrons is not coming solely from the prosecutor. Harrah's has to be pushing this thing.

[/ QUOTE ]

I disagree. This is likely out of Harrah's hands.

[/ QUOTE ]I disagree with you on this. Harrah's could have simply taken the loss or attempted to recover from the manufacturer. Unless the local DA knew about it and subpoenaed the tapes and material then it would have never gotten to him.

My guess is Harrah's brought it to his attention. DA's are busy enough without going out looking for things like this. Of course Harrahs is undoubtedly the number 1 revenue generator and tax generator for Harrison County so maybe the DA heard about it and went after them in order to protect the golden goose. Of course, this could also cost them money but I would highly doubt that.

I'm now finished contradicting myself and not as sure if I disagree with you or not TT. I would still say that Harrahs initially got the ball rolling on this though.

[youtalkfunny]

In most jurisdictions, the casino is required to report anything highly irregular to the authorities that oversee casinos (such as a Gaming Control Board).

This qualifies as "highly irregular". Did you think that Harrahs could go after the slot machine manufacturer, and the government wouldn't get involved?

[*TT*]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm now finished contradicting myself and not as sure if I disagree with you or not TT. I would still say that Harrahs initially got the ball rolling on this though.

[/ QUOTE ]

of course they got the ball rolling, they have regulatory issues they must contend with. But Its likely (based on experiance in other markets, I don't know how the laws work there) in the hands of the local casino commission which contacts the DA as necessary.

[bav]

I imagine Harrah's has a lot to do with this, but I also don't mind that they're thinking about prosecuting these folks. They aren't going to successfully prosecute grandma who just happened to wander by and pick a machine to play and who didn't even notice anything was wrong...she put her $100 in, played 10 minutes, cashed out, and disappeared. But the folks who sat there and fed in megabucks and used the thing like an ATM? Yeah...those folks deserve a KITN from the legal system.

One deserted Christmas break at college about 4am I went to put a dollar in a change machine and I noticed the front panel of the thing was not locked. I opened it just a tiny crack and yeah, there's a stack of bills inside. I didn't empty it--I called the cops who came over and looked and decided nobody had stolen anything so they just called the vendo folks and stood guard while waiting.

Taking the money from inside an unlocked change machine would have been stealing. It was 4am Dec 27th, or some such and I could trivially have done it and never been caught--but I don't do that. And I don't mind the idea of prosecuting someone who does such things. Taking money from a mis-set slot machine is also stealing and I don't mind prosecuting people who do that.

[Legislurker]

[ QUOTE ]
I imagine Harrah's has a lot to do with this, but I also don't mind that they're thinking about prosecuting these folks. They aren't going to successfully prosecute grandma who just happened to wander by and pick a machine to play and who didn't even notice anything was wrong...she put her $100 in, played 10 minutes, cashed out, and disappeared. But the folks who sat there and fed in megabucks and used the thing like an ATM? Yeah...those folks deserve a KITN from the legal system.

One deserted Christmas break at college about 4am I went to put a dollar in a change machine and I noticed the front panel of the thing was not locked. I opened it just a tiny crack and yeah, there's a stack of bills inside. I didn't empty it--I called the cops who came over and looked and decided nobody had stolen anything so they just called the vendo folks and stood guard while waiting.

Taking the money from inside an unlocked change machine would have been stealing. It was 4am Dec 27th, or some such and I could trivially have done it and never been caught--but I don't do that. And I don't mind the idea of prosecuting someone who does such things. Taking money from a mis-set slot machine is also stealing and I don't mind prosecuting people who do that.

[/ QUOTE ]

Youre flat out dead wrong about not prosecuting or persecuting grandma who didn't know what she was doing or just a lil greedy. I've seen some petty vindictive behavior towards small slot manipulation by granny when she finds out cashing out $20 from a nickel machine got her $25, and doing it a second time. I've seen slot superviosrs go way overboard on very innocent or ignorant people on small matters. They mostly want the indictment and to scare people, or find a dumass willing to confess or sign a piece of paper(in case you don't know never sign anything). I think they view the publicity on this as setting a precent to maybe stop someone from doing it again. Funny.

[Crane]

If they prosecuted me for this I'd tell em fine, let's see what a jury has to say.