Casino employees to bet at other venues in Ohio

The Ohio Senate has passed unanimously an amendment bill that allows casino employees to gamble at facilities where they don’t work.

US.- Casino employees in Ohio will be allowed to play in gaming venues where they don’t work after the state Senate passed House Bill 32 unanimously. The bill will amend a law that forbade, until now, staff members to play slots and wagers at any of the state’s four casinos.

As Cleveland.com reported, from now on a casino operator or employee will be able to “participate in casino gaming at a casino facility, so long as they don’t have an interest in the facility, aren’t employed at the facility and don’t have an interest or employment at an affiliated facility in Ohio.”

The same measure tried to pass twice last year but failed to do so as lawmakers feared that casino employees may use their internal knowledge and conspire with other workers to cheat. Therefore, they remained barred from gambling until the Senate’s recent vote.

If they failed to comply, they’d been charged with first degree misdemeanor, which might mean they’d spend 180 days in jail and a US$1,000 fine. However, the Ohio Legislative Service Commission hasn’t reported any cases of violations.

Matthew Schuler, Ohio Casino Control Commission executive director, said: “This will bring into alignment with neighboring jurisdictions where such an approach has proven fair and still maintains the integrity of casino gaming.”

“After five years of regulating and enforcing the law at Ohio’s casinos, we have not had a case of employees from different casinos working in collusion to cheat. In fact, given the systems of surveillance, segregated duties and internal controls unique to each casino operator, it would be difficult to even attempt.”