Illegal Gambling In Texas Sentence

1. The full text of this law may be found in the Texas Parks and Wildlife Code, §12.102 or call TPWD at (800) 792-1112 (press 9, then 4381) Waste of Game It is an offense (Class C misdemeanor) if a person while hunting kills or wounds a game bird or game animal and intentionally or knowingly fails to make a reasonable effort to retrieve the.
2. A Houston gambling parlor operator was sentenced Monday to federal prison for running a string of illegal 8-liner gaming operations for nearly a decade and laundering the illegal profits.

If you want to make your local corner store owner really nervous, try asking them this question – “How do those gaming machines work?” When I asked the owner of a store that I frequent, I got a very nervous “Why do you ask?” in response. It seems almost every independently run convenience store I go in has a small bank of video gaming (gambling) machines, also known as eight-liners, tucked away somewhere in the store. I got curious about all these machines and thought I’d write a post to share what I found out. This is an abnormal post for this site but falls under the “Dad is Learning” philosophy of living.

A BIG Loophole

Under the new law, convicted mail thieves could be sentenced to between 180 days in jail and 10 years in prison, depending on how many people they have targeted. They will also face fines ranging. Texas is one step closer to joining the 34 states where medicinal marijuana is legal after state legislators passed a law written by North Texas Republican representative and registered nurse.

Laws on video gaming machines vary from state to state. Texas is surrounded by states that allow gambling, leading to a high number of attempts to circumvent laws against gambling in Texas. Section §47 of the Texas Penal Code defines gambling but in §47.01(4) you will find the provision that has been litigated for over a decade that excludes “gambling devices” that are defined as “any electronic, electromechanical, or mechanical contrivance designed, made, and adapted solely for bona-fide amusement purposes if the contrivance rewards the player exclusively with non-cash merchandise prizes, toys, or novelties, or a representation of value redeemable for those items, that have a wholesale value available from a single play of the game or device of not more than 10 times the amount charged to play the game or device once or $5, whichever is less.” This is often referred to as the “fuzzy animal” defense, derived from the claw games you see in restaurants and elsewhere.

The loopholes in the law are numerous. The Dickinson County Police have posted an advisement from the Galveston County District Attorney’s office about this matter. Here are a few noted exceptions quoted from that site:

Illegal Gambling In Texas Sentence List

• Regarding the “charitable sweepstakes” issue: Typically this is done by some type of an association being made with the charity group by the owner of the 8-liners. The players put their money into the machine as a “donation” and you are allowed to play the game for free. At the end of the day the Charity may pay the owner of the machines $.90 out of every $1.00 collected. This is not an exception to the law.
• The use of “door prizes” to attract customers is presumed to be legal, provided the players are not given additional entries into the door prize drawing based on the number of credits they win on a game or device.
• The following could result in prosecution – Any award of non-cash merchandise prizes, toys, or novelties that have a wholesale value available from a single play of the game or device of more than 10 times the amount charged to play the game or device once, or $5.00, whichever is less. The accumulation or stacking of credits/tickets toward the purchase of more valuable prizes will be considered to be a violation of the law if the accumulated credits exceed the maximum value for a prize which can be awarded from the machine as noted above. The wholesale value of the prize, not the ticket, available from a single play, must be no more than 10 times the amount charged to play or $5.00, whichever is less.

The Difficulty of Enforcement

Gathering enough evidence to prosecute illegal gaming operations costs thousands of dollars and numerous man hours in already stretched thin police departments and district attorney offices. The machines are fairly portable and can be removed by simply unplugging them and wheeling them away on a dolly. Operations have been known to shut down and move overnight when there is suspicion of investigation. Due to the high volume of money involved, a few police officers have also been bribed to tip off the owners of illegal operations as occurred in Tarrant County in 2008.

The Meadowbrook Shopper, a neighborhood publication in Fort Worth, featured an interview with Tarrant County Sheriff Dee Anderson in the January 24, 2013 edition where he spoke about eight-liners in Fort Worth. Anderson said, “The machines have almost been eradicated in the county. At one time, we would have thousands of them in storage. Now, thanks to civil forfeiture through the Justice of the Peace Courts, we can seize them and have them destroyed within two weeks. Unfortunately, we’ve been so successful the machines are moving into smaller cities.”

Many may not have issue with the morality of the machines but call authorities when a loved one loses large amounts of money to unregulated gaming machines. Anderson said, “More-and-more we will get calls from concerned relatives when their parents, or older relatives on fixed incomes, get scammed out of all their money involving eight-liners. Believe me, it’s a big problem. There are usually drugs associated with these operations. It’s not uncommon for us to seize 20-40 thousand dollars after raiding just one small operation.”

Illegal Gambling In Texas Sentenced

Illegal gaming operations are also an easy target for criminals. There is typically a large amount of cash involved and operators won’t contact the police due to the illegal nature of their activities. This Star-Telegram article from 2013 details a Fort Worth man who was ambushed, robbed, and murdered in September 2013 outside of an illegal gaming operation.

Why Was I Curious?

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, I frequent two convenience stores that have a few of these machines. Let me be clear…I don’t play. These aren’t the illegal gambling dens that involve so much of the trouble documented in this post, but they are quite possibly operating in a grey area of the law. One store is close to my office and every time I have been in that location there is at least one person settled in and poking away at a machine. As several articles report, it is quite often people on a fixed-income, the unemployed, or the elderly who play on these machines.

A screenshot of the completed auction listings for the gaming machines.

Illegal Gambling In Texas Sentence Details

My curiosity was also peaked by an auction on LonestartAuctioneers.com this week. I follow the site regularly as part of my side hustle but was surprised to see gaming machines being auctioned off by the Texas Facilities Commission. I wasn’t familiar with this agency, but part of their responsibility is the oversight of surplus property programs. The machines in the auction went for an average selling price of $300 to $400, plus 10% buyers premium. The 31 machines in the auction fetched a total of $8,540 plus buyers premium.

I follow the opinion of most financial advisers, who believe gambling in it’s various forms is a tax on the poor and people who can’t do math. Dave Ramsey offers up great insight on the matter of gambling in “Gambling Offers False Hope.” There is a reason the big casino across the border builds a new hotel building every year. And there is a reason individuals are willing to risk a $4,000 fine and maximum sentence of a year in jail for running illegal gaming machines. Gambling is a sure-fire money maker for the owner.

A Beaumont, Texas man was sentenced to 33 months in prison for tax evasion and for running a business that accepted illegal wagers on sporting events from 1985 to 2017. Larry Tillery owned two companies and used both as a front to launder the illegal gambling money. He was ordered to pay restitution of $1,000,040 and to forfeit approximately two million dollars in cash and other items. A judgment of $32,758,541 was also ordered by the court.

His wife Judy was given 24 months’ probation and shares the judgment with her husband. She assisted with laundering the proceeds of the operation, which allowed bettors to place bets on sporting events, including professional and collegiate basketball, baseball and football games via a website.

Larry’s son Brian was also sentenced to 24 months’ probation and was ordered to forfeit $245,477 and a home worth $600,000. He collected money from bettors, paid bettors, made wire transfers to pay illegal gambling debts. He also regularly mailed currency totaling more than $10,000 through the US Post Office.

While the gambling operation was illegal, federal tax law still required that Tillery register with the IRS as a bookmaker, report total wages he accepted monthly, and pay a gross wagering excise tax of 2% every month. Between the years 2011 and 2016, Tillery took at least 52 million dollars in illegal wagers, resulting in over a million dollars in wagering taxes he did not pay.