When we hear about cheating in casinos, we mostly think of outsiders trying to scam the house. But every so often it’s an insider job.
Between July 2012 and July 2014, prosecutors say that two dealers at the Bellagio hotel-casino, assisted by two friends, stole more than $1 million from a craps table.
In September, all four were indicted on dozens of counts of cheating at gambling, and theft.
James Taylor of the Nevada State Gaming Control Board talked with KNPR's State of Nevada about the Bellagio case.
"The two dealers that were charged in this case were allowing the two patrons to make wagers after the outcome was known by a process known as a call bet or a hot bet," Taylor said.
Taylor said the suspects were first spotted by another dealer who noticed something was wrong.
From there, the control board worked with the casino's security team to investigate.
If a casino suspects a problem, it must report it to the control board. The problems range from small $5 crimes of opportunity to multi-million schemes involving organized crime.
However, very few of those crimes involve casino employees.
“There are 89,000 gaming employees in the state of Nevada,” James Taylor said. “We’re talking about a very small percentage of employees that we arrest each year. We arrest about 350 to 500 people a year. And 25 percent of our arrests, on average, are employees of the casino. On occasion it’ll be an employee and an outside agent that we arrest colluding with each other in different forms of scams.”
No matter how big or small the cheating is, Taylor said: "Any illegal act on the table is a felony."
James Taylor, Deputy Chief, Enforcement Division at the State of Nevada Gaming Control Board
