Jay Evensen
  • Front Page
  • Opinions
  • Second Thoughts
  • Portfolio
  • Awards
  • About

Are casinos culpable for Paddock's actions?

10/10/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
Stephen Paddock was a professional gambler who, his brother has said, knew the odds of each video poker machine he played to the tenth of a percent. If he happened to be a net loser at video poker for a period of time, he was a winner when all the comps were figured in — including free rooms, meals and expensive drinks.

All of which is a “total crock,” according to David Tarbert.
“The machines are built for him to lose,” he told me by phone Tuesday. “They don’t give these comps 
away and build those beautiful casinos based on a bad business model. It’s a good business model. It’s a sure-fire business model.”

Tarbert has some insights into that. A 57-year-old attorney in Tallahassee, Fla., he was addicted to gambling for 36 years. Come January, he will mark his third year of freedom from that compulsion.

It isn’t just Las Vegas, he said. Whether he gambled in Biloxi, on a cruise ship or along the Strip, it was the same. He was assigned a hostess. He was comped for this or that. He was made to feel he was a big shot. He knew, like so many others, that video poker was for chumps.

As a journalist who spent three years working for the Las Vegas Review-Journal, that sounds right to me. We used to joke that all the gleaming hotels on Las Vegas Boulevard were not built off winners. Nothing is as certain as the adage that the house always wins.

And few things are as alluring as the feeling that a big-time casino thinks you’re important enough to warrant a free meal or some other perk. It has been called “big shot-ism.” The allure can be blinding, until you hit rock bottom.

Tarbert describes how he and a friend would take advantage of those perks. “We’d have this delicious steak meal that was better than anything we would ever treat ourselves to,” he said. “Then on the ride home we’d say we could have bought a quarter of a cow with what we lost.”

As I write this, Paddock’s motive for opening fire on concertgoers from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel remains unknown. Gambling addiction may or may not have been a factor, although it’s worth noting police in the Philippines blamed an addicted gambler for killing 38 people by setting fire to a casino there earlier this year.

But what Tarbert and others I spoke to worry about is that the Mandalay Bay’s practices — and indeed the practices of virtually all casinos in an increasingly wealthy and powerful gambling industry — won’t get the scrutiny they deserve.

“No credible, independent person who deals with gambling in the United States and is not being paid by the gambling industry would say Stephen Paddock was a responsible gambler,” Les Bernal told me. He heads a group known as Stop Predatory Gambling.

Last December, the Atlantic did a lengthy story on the industry. Headlined, “How casinos enable gambling addicts,” it told in detail how everything from the way machines are programmed to the perks and the hostesses in casinos are designed to keep people gambling, either with their own money or with a loan from the house.

Tarbert told me how this always ends with a period of self-loathing, during which the gambler often feels suicidal.

A lot of questions remain unanswered. On Tuesday, police revealed that Paddock shot a hotel security guard a full six minutes before he opened fire on the crowd. It was unclear why the hotel did not notify police of this.

Casinos surely have records of how much Paddock gambled and how he did over time. Was he really an effective gambler?

How was he allowed to carry all those weapons to his room without any questions? Why, as some news reports said Tuesday, might he have had access to a freight elevator? Why are video poker machines programmed to make players think they’re only one card away from a big payoff when that isn’t true?
​
There may be a hundred possible reasons why Paddock wanted to kill all those people. In the search for an answer, details of how casinos operate must not avoid careful scrutiny, especially since every state but Hawaii and Utah now allows some form of legalized gambling.
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    RSS Feed

    Search this site


    Like what you read here?

      Please subscribe below, and we'll let you know when there is a new opinion.

    Enter your email address:

    Delivered by FeedBurner

    Picture

    The author

    Jay Evensen is the Senior Editorial Columnist of the Deseret News. He has nearly 40 years experience as a reporter, editor and editorial writer in Oklahoma, New York City, Las Vegas and Salt Lake City. He also has been an adjunct journalism professor at Brigham Young and Weber State universities.

    Archives

    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012

    Categories

    All
    Campaign 2012
    Congress
    Crime
    Culture
    Iran
    Oil And Gas
    Poverty
    Steroids
    Taxes
    Utah
    Washington
    World Events
    World Events

    Links

    Deseret News
    Newslink
    Marianne Evensen's blog

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.