Posted on 03/07/2014 10:35:15 AM PST by Wolfie
Gambler sues casino, says he lost $500,000 playing drunk
LAS VEGAS -- A businessman who lost $500,000 on table games at a Las Vegas casino on Super Bowl weekend is arguing that he shouldn't have to pay because he was blackout drunk.
Southern California gambler Mark Johnston, 52, is suing the Downtown Grand for loaning him money and serving him drinks when he was visibly intoxicated.
Nevada law bars casinos from allowing obviously drunk patrons to gamble and from serving them comped drinks.
Johnston's attorney, Sean Lyttle, says the Grand, which opened last November in the old part of Las Vegas, intends to pursue Johnston for trying to shirk his gambling debts. Johnston put a stop-payment order on the markers, or casino credits, the Grand issued, and is also seeking damages from the Grand for sullying his name.
Johnston says he was thoroughly drunk during the hours he spent playing pai gow and blackjack at the Grand. His legal team plans to rely on eyewitness testimony and surveillance video to prove that he was visibly intoxicated.
Johnston lives in Ventura and made his fortune in car dealership and real estate ventures.
The Grand issued a statement saying it does not comment on pending litigation.
The state Gaming Control Board is investigating.
"It's certainly an extraordinary case. This is not a story that I've ever heard before, where someone was blackout intoxicated where they couldn't read their cards, and yet a casino continued to serve them drinks and issue them more markers," Lyttle said. "It's a very heavy-handed and unusual approach that we haven't seen in this town in a long time."
Johnston arrived in Las Vegas with the woman he was dating on the Thursday before the Super Bowl. He drank in the limousine from the Las Vegas airport to the Grand, drank more during dinner with friends, and then says he blacked out.
The suit alleges that the Grand comped him dozens of drinks while he gambled away hundreds of thousands of dollars, finally sleeping off his drunkenness on that Saturday, which was Feb, 1. Johnston says he didn't learn how much he had lost until the next day.
In 2009, a gambler who famously lost $127 million sued a Vegas casino, claiming staff regularly plied him with alcohol and painkillers in order to keep him gambling. He eventually cut a deal with the casino and criminal charges against him were dropped.
Hey, serves you right... but really... I mean you didn't have to go and marry the b!tch on top of it. Demon liquor! Sheesh!
</sarc>
Tough luck, Mr. Johnston. Big money players always get free drinks. You don’t think that is just a “thanks”, do you?
Sure we do. Recognizing the above, I go in, stuff myself for next to nothing at the buffet, soak up free booze while nursing five bucks worth of nickels playing video poker, then walk out again.
So would I. Except for the part of having him sign off on loans when he's knocked-out drunk.
Using his logic, if he’d won instead of losing, could the casino sue him for what he won because he was drunk?
I don’t know.....there does seem to be a bit of inconsistency in the legal system as far as consent and intoxication.
So if he won he would of course have returned the money.
I learned a similar trick when forcibly dragged into a Vegas Casino that only does slots (and video poker). I sat at a bar for more than 90 minutes playing video poker after putting a $50 bill in the machine. When it was time to go, I realized several things:
1) I was up $12 2) I had imbibed A LOT of top shelf libations for free while sitting there. 3) Upon getting up to leave with my loving wife, I learned that I was unusually inebriated.
I gave the bartender the $12 dollars as a tip. I am sure that bar tab was over $100 (retail).
The “nest egg “.
“...and it was at that point that I realized my life had become completely unmanageable.”
Really, if you’re capable of getting blackout drunk and dropping half a million dollars over a weekend, you’ve got bigger problems than losing the half mill.
When I was in the USAF one of the enlisted guys in my squadron hit a BIG jackpot on the slots. When they took him in to pay, he had to show ID for tax purposes etc. Too bad he was under 21. All he got was escorted out the door.....
Played a 5-10 no-limit at the Inn of the Mountain Gods in Ruidoso NM, 5 called the big blind and I had QJ suited. The flop came QJJ with the QJ suited, at the river there was three of us and one was all in with 3400 dollars in the pot. I had a boat, one had a a high straigh and the other a flush. I took down the pot and the other player congratulated me, the all in player approached at the bar and complained that was all the money he had. I told him he should have never sat at the table, then gave him a black chip and walked away. Some people don’t know when to quit.
“Sure we do. Recognizing the above, I go in, stuff myself for next to nothing at the buffet, soak up free booze while nursing five bucks worth of nickels playing video poker, then walk out again.”
That pretty much describes how I plan out my Vegas trips as well.
I was very upset the year I discovered that they removed the video poker machines from the outdoor carnival court bar at Harrahs and I had to start paying 5+ dollars per beer instead of free like before.
Now I see that they tore down O’Sheas! One of my favorite people watching, watch the game, video poker free beer bars.
Ugh!!
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