Do Casinos Invite Crime — The Best Online Casino Articles - TheBestCasinoGuide.com

Many people have an image of casinos as a sort of modern version of the Wild West; riddled with crime and criminals who are just drooling to steal everyone blind. This is far from the truth about casinos and crime. The facts are very complex and although there are issues, the situation is not out of control. Communities can prosper with legal gambling in their midst. The casino industry has undergone vast changes since it’s gangster riddled beginnings with Al Capone and Bugsy Siegel. Let’s take a look at some of the issues involved in casino gambling, discuss the changes in the casino industry and see some the answers to this important question.

LAND BASED CASINOS:

Let’s step back in time for a moment and look at the beginnings of legal gambling in America and Las Vegas. Las Vegas was originally the brain child of a notorious gangster named Benny "Bugsy"Siegel and backed by the muscle and money of the mob’s crime commission. The financial genius of men like Meyer Lansky helped the mob create a paradise for gambling, money skimming, money laundering, loan sharking, prostitution and all the worst sorts of activities that can be associated with casinos. In its heyday, the mob era casinos were the new Wild West and crime ran rampant. However, as time passed, the outlandish behavior and crime in Las Vegas casinos became too hard to ignore and the government was forced to crack down. Slowly but surely, most of the criminal aspects of Las Vegas and more recently, Atlantic City, have given way to corporate investment by the likes of Donald Trump and Steve Wynn. As major corporations and banks began to take an interest in Casinos in Las Vegas and Atlantic City, the mob was slowly pushed out of most of the casino industry. While the mob may still have influence in unions, construction, trucking and liquor and food distribution, their overt control of these casinos has become a thing of the past.

The authors of the study "Does the Presence of Casinos Increase Crime? An Examination of Casino and Control Communities" B. Grant Stitt, Mark Nichols and David Giacopassi said "Crime rates increased significantly in some casino communities, some remained relatively stable, and others decreased. The authors conclude that crime does not inevitably increase with the introduction of a casino into a community, but that the effects of casinos on crime appear to be related to a variety of variables which are only poorly understood." In other words, the level of crime in casino communities is related to the level of knowledge and effort in the community to prevent casino crime. It has always been the case that when a community is serious about enforcing the rules and the law, crime does not flourish but when a community is riddled with corruption and lax law enforcement, crime will increase dramatically.

Other studies have found that in some areas casino crime does tend to rise after a period of time has elapsed. A study done by Georgia economist David B. Mustard and Earl L. Grinols of Baylor University analyzed crime data collected from all 3,165 U.S. counties in the United States over a 20 year period from 1977 to 1996 and calculated the local crime rates before and after casinos opened. They found that at first crime levels where down while employment and tax revenues went up. However, according to their study, " By the fifth year of operation, robberies were up 136 percent; aggravated assaults, 91 percent; auto theft, 78 percent; burglary, 50 percent; larceny, 38 percent; and rape, 21 percent. Controlling for other factors, 8.6 percent of property crimes and 12.6 percent of violent crimes were attributed to casinos." Mustard went on to say, "The positive effects of casinos are fleeting; payrolls and tax collections quickly plateau, and municipalities don’t keep adding cops after the first wave of casino tax revenue rolls in." As in other studies, the bottom line indicates that communities must remain vigilant and not rest on their laurels. The growth of law enforcement and legal supervision must stay level with the growth of casinos within the community for crime levels to remain low and for the benefits to the community to be long term.

When it comes local crime such as robbery, violence and theft, it is up to communities that allow gambling to carefully monitor their crime rates and expand law enforcement in a proactive way rather than after all hell has broken loose. By keeping track of what’s occurring in the community and adding police as required, crime can be controlled locally. If communities are forced to expand law enforcement and they can factually attribute this to the casinos in the area, then the casino’s taxes should increase to assist the community in paying for additional law enforcement. Casinos should be required to employ from within their community in order to contribute to the growth of the community as it is a well known fact that higher employment leads to a lower crime rate.

One aspect of casino crime that gets a lot of press is fraud related crime that has become associated with addicted gamblers. Sadly, there is a small percentage of gamblers for whom gambling becomes a disease of addiction and some of these people have turned to check forgery and embezzlement to finance their gambling. In one case, a 41 year old woman from Bangor, Maine, forged $40,000 in checks belonging to elderly people and she proceeded to lose it all by playing the slot machines at a local casino. She chose to plead guilty to the crime and asked for mercy based on her addiction. She was sent to prison for 3 years. Cases like these will happen and it is incumbent on casinos to do everything in their power to monitor for signs of compulsive gambling. We all realize that casinos are in business to take bets but if they wish to retain the support of their communities, then they must help to prevent the problems. The casinos must provide gamblers with easy access to resources that offer help for gambling addiction. These resources should be posted clearly on every casino website and a pamphlet on gambling addiction should be made available to gamblers at the cashier windows of every land based casinos. We would also like to see casinos financing public service messages about gambling addiction. As supporters of the gambling industry, we realize how important it is for casinos to be seen as helping with solutions instead of creating the problems. The image of the out of control drunk losing his rent money must become as much a thing of the past as Al Capone and Prohibition. Casinos must spend money and develop effective resources to monitor for addicted gamblers and to provide assistance for addicted gamblers to help maintain a healthy community.

It is obvious when it comes to land based casinos, all parties must work together to prevent casino crime. Casinos must understand that they are part of the community and help the community maintain a safe environment. The rest of the community needs to welcome casinos as a desired member of the community and not stigmatize the casinos from the start with negative thinking and attitudes. There is great potential for tax revenues, employment and general growth to be gained from the casino industry. When the casinos and the rest of the community work together as partners for growth, studies show that communities can prosper.

ONLINE CASINOS:

The growth of online gambling has led to some new concerns about crime. The biggest concern for online casinos is the issue of fraud. People wonder if the games are honest and if the casinos will pay them when they win. There have also been issues with non payment of bonuses and hidden fees. Online casinos that engage in this sort of behavior are known as "Rogue" casinos. The online gamblers of the world have been wise enough to make good use of the world wide web and have banded together to create a network of forums and casino portal websites that monitor, review and discuss the activities of online casinos. There are websites that provide blacklists of Rogue casinos and also lists of approved, safe casinos. There are forums where gamblers can post their experiences dealing with online casinos and make other gamblers aware of dishonest behavior. There are also portal websites like that rate and review many of the online casinos in the industry. It is incumbent on any online gambler to do solid research before gambling with real money at any online casino. By making good use of the resources available to online gamblers on the internet, one can go along way towards finding safe and honest online casinos.

The online casino industry has a different set of issues and problems. By the very nature of the internet, there is far less potential for crimes of violence and much higher potential for fraud, money laundering and identity theft. At the present time, many of these issues are dealt with by the vigilance of the online gambling community itself. There are some organizations starting to develop, like Ecorga, to assist in monitoring the online casino industry and licensing is a great help but more needs to be done. In order to easily monitor online casinos and to control crime, there needs to be one international body that sets and enforces standards for all online casinos. This agency must work in co operation with the various licensing jurisdictions and governments to report and sanction any casinos engaging in dishonest or illegal activities. Sadly, as long as the United States flies in the face of world opinion and maintains it’s ban on online casinos, it will be that much harder to have any sort of official supervision of the online casino industry. At this time, online gamblers have to make full use of all the various resources available through websites like http://www.thebestcasinoguide.com/ to find the safest online casinos. Online gamblers can find fair and honest casinos at which they may gamble, but it will be much easier and safer when the online casino industry becomes better supervised and better organized. At present, there is too much reliance on the efforts of online gamblers themselves to keep casinos honest while various countries wrangle with each other about allowing legal online gambling.