http://kdvr.com/2017/11/15/casino-cu...-slot-credits/
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Sounds like quite a racket. What's to stop the state from having agents wander around leaving a nickel in every blessed machine and then prosecuting anybody who plays them?Quote:
Originally Posted by kewlJ
The kicker is not posting warnings to check machines for any amounts left behind, no matter how small.
Dan was a fool for saying anything to security.
Had he kept his mouth shut he'd have walked.
Idiot.
That was a long article. Does anyone know if Nevada has the same laws on the books as Colorado that abandoned chips or credits belong to the casino?
Some machines won't even show you if you have less than a certain amount. Different machines work different ways. AFAIK, they only work like this:Quote:
Originally Posted by redietz
1. If you insert an amount that cannot be evenly divisible by the lowest denomination on that machine, it spits out the excess. IE: You put $101.25 into a $1 minimum machine, it spits out a $0.25 voucher.
2. Same as above, but does not spit out the excess. Instead, it'll show "101 credits" and when switched to cash amount, it'll show "$101.25".
3. Same as above, except it'll show "101.25 credits" and "$101.25" in cash.
I've actually had a machine that showed something like 90.125 credits (importance on the three places behind the decimal). It's weird to see if you've never seen it before.
So, if the machines were set like #2, you could actually have the cage print up a bunch of $0.05 (or $0.01, why give away the farm?) vouchers, put those vouchers into machines, and those machines would read "0 credits". An unsuspecting customer would approach the machine, put some money in, and start playing, not noticing there was already a nickel or a penny in it. And BOOM -- caught red handed, time to bring that dirty criminal to jail so he can await his prison sentencing!!!
NOTE: Just so there isn't any confusion, I am NOT saying casino staff, gaming agents, or anyone else goes around putting in 5c or 1c vouchers into all the machines to "catch" people. Just saying it is possible to do.
EDIT: That was my #1,234'th post.
Machine with digital displays for credits often will show a decimal after the zero if there is less than a full credit in the machine.
Pennsylvania also has this law - abandoned monies belong to the casino. This includes change on the floor - like if you see a penny don't pick it up it's not yours.
All gaming states have a similar law as far as I know, and definitely Las Vegas does.Quote:
Originally Posted by FABismonte
I'm not a criminal lawyer but my recollection from law school (too many years ago) is that any kind of "theft", "robbery", "larceny" etc. are specific intent crimes. There must be a specific intent to permanently deprive one of their property. So if you sit down and put $100 in a machine and there was a 5 cent hanger, you did not have the specific intent required to be charged.
Of course, proof and the time and cost to defend it are a different story.
These laws are mainly on the books to prevent vagrants and other undesirables from stalking slot machines and grabbing them as soon as someone stands up with money left in them -- whether intentionally or unintentionally.
Same thing with uncashed tickets. They don't want vagrants walking around scouring the place for them, which gives the whole casino a bad look.
But I'm not sure what's going on in Colorado, where they seem to be intentionally looking for innocent people to prosecute.
Clearly the government is making money from it, but what's in it for the casinos? I am guessing this is seen as "cooperation", and casinos are either scared not to, or they are getting some kind of incentive on the back end, such as more forgiveness when their own minor violations are caught.
It is also possible that these Colorado casinos have the same problem with vagrants that some Vegas ones do, and the state is only willing to help crack down on it if they can go after everyone who does it.
Golden Nugget Laughlin, walking through the bar look down and low and behold a hundy and a couple twenties or so (don't really remember the total but less than two hundred) pick it up sit down at the bar and wait about ten minutes nobody shows up so it's now my money. Thank you.
That happened to me a couple years ago in a casino in downtown LV.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dan Druff
I'd stepped away for five or so seconds, leaving my card in the machine with credits, only to find some fucking tramp in my seat!
I told the bum that it was my money; he tried to argue but my comment "fine, I'll call security" quickly won the battle.
I just found this thread. I have a little experience credit hustling as I did it off and on from 92 to 96. I know someone who was prosecuted in Blackhawk, Colorado in 1995 for spinning off $2 on a machine. I did my own share of credit hustling that year in Blackhawk They never caught me. In those days the bartop video pokers were coin feeders. A lot of the public had no idea that if a coin didn't register it would shoot down to the pigion hole underneath the bar. I swept them out in the mornings from the play the night before. Sometimes a pigeon hole would be full to the top with quarters or dollars. The pigeon holes were out of sight from surveillance so it was an easy gig.
In the article that KJ posted up you can see that the law governing abandoned credits is pretty damn strict and harsh. This goes back to when gambling was first legalized in Blackhawk and Cripple Creek. There was an old guy in Cripple Creek they called The Colonel. I used to play poker with him. In 1990 he read a newspaper article about how gambling had revived the ghost town of Deadwood, South Dakota. The Colonel had one of those old tourist photo shops in the ghost town of Cripple Creek. All the town had then was a little bit of summer tourism. The Colonel came up with the idea of legalized gambling in Cripple Creek. He started the movement.
The Governor, Roy Roemer, a three term Democrat and a staunch Christian was adamantly opposed to gambling. He said he would veto any legislation sent his way that legalized gambling. The pro gamblers started petitions to get the issue on statewide ballot which they were successful in doing. The people of Colorado defied Roemer and voted to legalize gambling in the mountain towns of Cripple Creek, Blackhawk and Central City.
But Roemer still had the right to appoint the Gaming Commission. He had zero tolerance for corruption. He appointed Christian types to the Gaming Commission as he considered them the most honest and dependable. But they also knew nothing about gaming. They pretty much copycatted the Nevada Regs but wrote them much stricter and much harsher. The offshoot is they got draconian laws like the abandoned credit law.
I am not talking about the arrests....but isnt that the expectation everywhere. For example if you are walking down the aisle of Rite aid...and find a 100 dollar bill, and hand it into management....I dont think you would be offered the money if no one picked it up. Its private property and everything on the shelves and floor are the property of the renter/owner. And you own everyting that you walked in with and what you paid for on the way out.
So if money is on the floor of the casino, or sitting on topof a slot machine, or located inside a slot machine unused....I can see how the casino claims it.
But I cant see how they allow themselves to lose customers over this. For every single customer that doesnt go back because they were arrested and put through emotional and financial stress.....there are dozens others of their personal friends and relatives that wont go there either. And with publicity in newspapers and internet....make that hundreds of people who may not enter. In small towns, word gets around fast.
I am sure the police could on a daily basis bust the casino for serving under aged or letting under aged gamble.....and maybe this is a moneymaking scheme for the local police departments and city coffers .Being closed down for serving underaged...and the huge fines that it must entale.....i guess makes losing a few hundred customers tolerable.
I've been told by other gamblers that in Atlantic City all they can do to you for credit hustling is 86 you for 24 hours. This may go back to Ken Uston's successful lawsuit. And in Mississippi abandoned credits belong to the public not the casino. So you can't be charged but they can 86 you.
In Las Vegas in the 90's credit hustling was an ongoing nuisance to the casinos. They didn't charge anyone they just 86'd them. To much paperwork I guess. Riviera was the only place that sent people to jail so credit hustlers avoided the place.
So then, if you find money in a private establishment it belongs to either the establishment or to the public, depending on what state you live in.
If you find money on the sidewalk, in public, you can keep it.
But what about quasi-public locations like airports and subway stations?
yeah imagine finding 5 dollars in an airport terminal.... a sting operation.....and as you board the plane you are taken from your seat in handcuffs.
Or maybe as you deboard the plan in another state you are arrested for the original crime...plus transporting stolen goods over state lines.
Or maybe in a casino the police put a 5 dollar bill on a fishing line,,,,and slowly real you in as u keep trying to pick it up......attempted theft...all on video
I wonder if there was a penny on a machine when you sat down, and you put a 20 dollar bill in....and played and won a jackpot...if the casino could void the action based on theft
I remember a case from Detroit Motor City where they detained a little old lady, who came in on a day trip and lost all her money, for picking up a nickel token out of a trey and playing it. They backroomed her then made her go sit in the bus in the middle of winter. She won a high 6 figure lawsuit over it.
I found the article:Quote:
Originally Posted by mickeycrimm
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...7kc6L32O0EexgD