Casino Game Security

Sometimes casino game security is important, sometimes it's just funny. There was a great crap game going the other day - right next to the crummy point-seven, point-seven game I was on, so I grabbed my chips and moved over just in time to get down on the new shooter's hand.

She and her husband pushed into the game one roll before me, but just in time to shoot the dice. So, the stickman pushes the dice boat to one of the inside dealers who moves it out to the hook of the table and dumps out the five dice and looks at the new shooter. She smiles, grabs all five dice, and heaves them down the table where they ricocheted wildly, one managing to escape the table completely and roll under a blackjack game.

"No dice, no call," screams the stickman. "Well, well, a dice virgin," says the boxman, but everybody understands and the stickman explains the use of just two dice, so we start again.

She's red in the face, but taking it well, and this time she picks out just two of the remaining four dice. She looks at her husband for encouragement, but her hand holding the dice dips below the edge of the table. The stickman tells her he needs to see the dice again. She puts them on the table, he sticks them over to the boxman who checks them quickly and they make their way back out to the young lady. She tosses them overhand but misses the table.

One hits a player in the shoulder and falls in the rail. The other finds a crack in the player's defenses and sails past. The boxman goes off to find the die and the stickman shows her how to swing her arm slowly, parallel to the table, to keep them from flying away.

She's embarrassed and tells her husband she doesn't want to play. He pick's up their bets from the pass line and they disappear into the Saturday crowd, only a few steps behind another player from the other side of the table who veers and heads off in another direction.

The inside dealer tips the diceboat over and offers the last two dice to the next shooter. He takes them gingerly, shakes them where the stickman can still see his hand, and lofts them gently towards the other end of the table. "Seven, front-line winner," says the stickman. "Pay the line." Ah, the best part of craps.

Paying the front line has never been so hard, because two different players are screaming about their bets. Or, more accurately, their missing bets. Apparently $1000 in chips is missing from the pass line. The game breaks down as managers are called, security is called, surveillance watches tapes, and that $1000 in chips has by now traveled miles away to be cashed in another day.

Everybody was watching the new shooter struggle with the dice. The dealers were so careful making sure they could see the dice that nobody watched the bets on the layout. They'll probably get a couple days on the street, without pay. The dealers, not the bets.

Casino game security is very important. Supervisors are in the suspicion business, but sometimes the system still breaks down. So, the next time you are playing at your local casino, don't just watch the dealers and the other players, keep an eye on your own chips, too.