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The Mississippi Lawyer Spring 2015 17 Despite the office bracket betting pool seeming like a national pastime and a presidential tradition it is still illegal in this state to bet on the outcome of a sport- ing event. However in Mississippi sports betting is only a part of the states illegal gaming. Pursuant to Mississippi Code Annotated 97-33-1 Mississippi law allows for the construction of licensed casinos within 800 feet of the Gulf of Mexico and on the Mississippi River but gaming is strictly forbidden outside those gaming floors. What constitutes gaming is generally defined in the Mississippi Gaming Control Act Miss. Code Ann. 75-76-1 et. seq. but also specifically list- ed are 21 other games like poker black- jack craps etc. The mere playing of these games with or without wagers outside of a licensed casino is considered illegal. Some states such as Florida do allow for penny games wherein a friendly private poker game could be conducted with nominal wagers and winnings. However in Mississippi casino games are illegal with friends as a fund raiser or for chari- ty and despite a million proposals to circumvent the law i.e. no wagers no winnings etc. there is simply no way to get around the fact that the game itself is illegal. It would sell the industrious criminals of Mississippi short to think of the states illegal gaming as limited to office pools and friendly poker games. Large sports book operations exist as do high stakes poker games. Additionally throughout Mississippi slot machines continue to pop-up in service stations restaurants and sometimes even dedicated retail spaces. Unlike our gaming brethren in Louisiana these machines are illegal. A trip to any of Mississippis licensed casi- nos would reveal a wide range of slot style games but ultimately a slot machine is any machine or device which accepts a wager directly or indirectly in exchange for the chance of winning a prize. Even the innocuous looking quarter-pusher device a machine that literally accepts quarters until the pusher pushes the pile of quarters off for the user to collect falls into this category. Mississippi Gaming Comn v. Henson 800 So.2d 110 Miss. 2001. About the only slot machine that wont see you charged with a crime is the vintage kind and even those machines need to be inoperable and over 25 years old. There are some games of chance that legally exist outside of the licensed casi- nos. Bingo licenses are issued by the Gaming Commission but are restricted to registered charities. Some non-profit organizations may hold a raffle without having to get any approval from the state if the raffle is conducted by and solely for the benefit of that organization. The annu- al Dream Home raffle falls into this cate- ach year many in the state join the nation in com- pleting their March Madness brackets. Even the President of the United States participates.E By Louis Frascogna Continued on next page Illegal Gaming A Mississippi Tradition