Another Example Of No Personally Responsibility....

[CuongNhuka]

It doesn't make our courts seem like any more of a joke then Judge Judy does.

 

[newGuy12]

Have any of you known a compulsive gambler?

I have known two of them, and its nothing but a mess! These casinos care about nothing but money and are evil! People should stay away from these things if they have any problems with the gambling. I myself have never had the inclination to gamble and that suits me.

I have no regard for these places. I don't think that this lady whould sue them, but, if she wins the suit, haha, there would be no regret from me if she took them for all they are worth!!!

 

[MJS]

I read about this in todays paper. Honestly, when I read it I had a good laugh. Personally, I think this woman is nuts, and is just another in the long line of people who can't admit their own shortcomings. Nobody forced her to sit and play at the casino, she did it on her own. The casinos here in CT. have signs plastered all over the place saying, "If you have a gambling addiction or know someone who does, please call this number."

Now, is there a chance she'll win? Who knows, anything is possible, but IMHO, if any judge or jury awards her what shes asking, or any amount for that matter, they should have their heads examined.

 

[newGuy12]

Now, is there a chance she'll win? Who knows, anything is possible, but IMHO, if any judge or jury awards her what shes asking, or any amount for that matter, they should have their heads examined.

Yes, but I will repeat this: Remember, when you are in a court of law, "common sense" has nothing to do with anything -- the only thing that matters is LEGALITY, and that is unknown to all but the attorneys!

 

[MJS]

That this woman refuses to take personal responsibility for her becoming "addicted" to gambling says that she has a long road ahead of her. I don't think any of the casinos there forced her to sit at the tables day in and day out and wasting her money. She could've gotten up and leave at any time.
True the casinos gave her red-carpet treatment, but they'd give ME red-carpet treatment if I blow a lot of money there all the time. It's called customer service. But it's something that is supposedly easy to say "No" to. She didn't and thus she screwed herself out of the supposed million dollars she lost at the gaming tables.

My Grandmother frequents the casinos we have and has spent quite a bit of cash there. She gets all those red carpet treatment things as well. Some she takes advantage of, some she doesnt. Its a perk to show how much they supposedly appreciate your business. Obviously, as you said, she felt that she was expected to sit and play, when in reality she could have walked away, again, as you said.

 

[MJS]

I'm not so sure about this myself. I think if what she is saying is true I can see her point of view. From the way that she describes the situation it sounds as if she was clearly in a state of mental breakdown and it should have been obvious to the casino owners (who judging by the red carpet treatment were watching her and aware of her actions).

The fact that she was not eating or sleeping for five days, and with that her self care and hygiene would obviously be left wanting, should have rung alarm bells to the casino bosses that this lady was mentally ill and therefore lacked the capacity to make her decisions. I understand the points about personal responsibility but I have worked with people in the acute manic stages of Bipolar Affective Disorder and Schizophrenia and her behaviour of excessive spending and lack of personal care and lack of sleeping would not look out of place in those conditions. I am not suggesting she had Bipolar or Schizophrenia but what I am noting is that by the way she was acting she would have appeared like somebody mentally unwell but the casino bosses still took her cash.

To offer a similar example, when I was a student mental health nurse I worked on a dementia ward and we had a lady admitted who's family were in a dreadful state because a double glazing salesman had turned up at this very clearly unwell old ladies door and told her she needed these windows and had got her to sign a contract! It would have been obvious to the salesman that this lady was cognitively impaired and mentally unfit. She was disorientated and confused and the salesman explioted this.

Another example I remember is somebody in the manic stages of Bipolar taking all of their belongings out in the street, clearly mentally disturbed screaming that people could take what they wanted because Jesus had told her that she needed to get rid of her material possesions! Every person who took advantage of this situation were exploiting this young ladies mental illness.

I honestly feel that though these examples are of different presentations they have a similar theme to what the Casino Bosses were doing if the lady was presenting the way that she claims. Though people do have a personal responsibility I also strongly believe that we society have a responsibility to protect and not exploit people if they become mentally incapacitated through psychiatric illness.

Mind you she is a lawyer so there is a good chance she is making it all up!!

But, is it the job of the casino to keep tabs on every single person? You can be an addict and spend thousands and you can be an addict and spend hundreds. Of course, depending on your lifestyle, spending $500 could put one in trouble.

I doubt she's mentally ill, because she seems to have enough wit about her to know that she's flushing her life down the drain. She needs to admit that she has a serious problem and she needs to start taking steps to correct it. Filing a suit against the casino isn't the first step IMHO.

Mike

 

[grydth]

Well there are some court costs and at some point if she gets the wrong judge he could get pissed and put her on the hook for the costs of the casino lawyers....
And it again IMHO makes the US courts look pathetic....

When I see somebody repeat a line....."and it again"........it makes me believe somebody is spoiling for a fight.

Okay, you've found one.

Don't you think you should at least await a judicial decision at the trial level before declaring to all, "the US courts look pathetic" ?

If you are asserting that the mere filing of a civil suit by one party in one court suffices to smear all courts, can you suggest your rules for how this can be changed?

Let's even suppose this person goes on to win something..... how's that suffice to condemn the Workers Comp Judge in Buffalo, the Family Court Judge in Topeka or the Traffic Court Judge in San Antonio?

Would the presence of one wacky, misinformed member making a single post on Martial Talk suffice to condemn the entire Forum, and indeed all MA Forums, as "pathetic" ?

 

[BrandiJo]

According to the article quote, that's exactly what the casino did. Exclusive limosine transport to the tables, allowing her to bring her dog to the tables (which I can only presume was special treatment, I'm not familiar with casino rules about pets), actively inviting her when she was brushing her teeth with wet-wipes? If the standard is whether she was targeted for special treatment, then the casino's screwed.

I figure they would do that to anyone willing to spend the kind of money im assuming she was spending. I have heard about casino's that have special people hired to deal with and cater to the big spenders that frequent them. Not because they are addicted but because they have that kind of money to burn. But if they knew she had a problem and paid special attention to her because of her problem then they may get nailed.
However sueing them isn't going to fix her trouble and its not going to get her the help she needs. She will revert back to her troubled behavior and then the process starts over until she is ready for help.

 

[MJS]

Have any of you known a compulsive gambler? Its not something they can just walk away from anymore then a drunk can walk away from a bar, or a crack addict can pass up his next fix.

Actually yes. Both of my brother in laws love to gamble. One tends to be a bit worse than the other. However, my sisters husband is able to keep things under control. He leaves all this ATM/credit cards home and takes a set amount with him. Once its gone, thats it. As much as he likes to play, he is good about using his head.

However i feel her family, or friends should have stepped up and helped her.

Agreed.

The casino is not to blame, but when a dealer sees the same woman in day after day and she grows agitated at the amount of money she is losing and yet she still cant leave something should have been said. But they are in it to make money so i doubt they will lose the case so long as they can prove that she wasn't unfairly targeted for special treatment because they felt she was prone to being addicted.

But one has to wonder....casinos see thousands of people. They switch out dealers on a regular basis. I think for someone to blame the casino or dealers for not stepping in, is just another way of not taking blame for ones own shortcomings. Now did her family know about this? Did she have anyone to fall back on for help? I have no idea, but you can't walk into any casino without seeing some signs plastered all over reminding people of the gambling hotline number.

 

[myusername]

But one has to wonder....casinos see thousands of people. They switch out dealers on a regular basis. I think for someone to blame the casino or dealers for not stepping in, is just another way of not taking blame for ones own shortcomings. Now did her family know about this? Did she have anyone to fall back on for help? I have no idea, but you can't walk into any casino without seeing some signs plastered all over reminding people of the gambling hotline number.

Absolutley, I can see what you are saying here and I strongly suspect that this argument will be the main response the Casino uses in their defence.

However, I think that there may be more to meet the eye here than the limited information in the article. My point of view on this depends wholly on how erratically the lady was behaving - she mentions that she stayed at the table for 5 whole days without sleep and food! How was she acting with that amount of sleep exhaustion? Was she hallucinating? Passing out at the table? Was her speech coherent or peppered with bizarre content? What was her self care and hygiene like? Was she using the toilet? What was her mood like? Was she openly weeping and crying? Was she presenting highly agitated and distressed?

If the lady was genuinely acting and behaving in a way that would have left the Casino Bosses in no doubt that she was exhibiting signs of possible mental illness and therefore lacked capacity to make informed decisions and they still persisted in exploiting her then I think good luck to her and I hope she wins. Its all very well that the Casino switches dealers regularly but it is clear that the Casino did notice her as there started offering perks and luxeries to keep her there. I think that they would have been watching her.

If however, she was not behaving in a way that would make her look any different from the average highrolling punter then the Casino should win the case.

I wonder how she could prove her case though? Is there any CCTV footage? Has she any witnesses? I don't think we can truly make a judgement on who is right and wrong with the limited infomation in the article.

 

[MJS]

Absolutley, I can see what you are saying here and I strongly suspect that this argument will be the main response the Casino uses in their defence.

However, I think that there may be more to meet the eye here than the limited information in the article. My point of view on this depends wholly on how erratically the lady was behaving - she mentions that she stayed at the table for 5 whole days without sleep and food! How was she acting with that amount of sleep exhaustion? Was she hallucinating? Passing out at the table? Was her speech coherent or peppered with bizarre content? What was her self care and hygiene like? Was she using the toilet? What was her mood like? Was she openly weeping and crying? Was she presenting highly agitated and distressed?

If the lady was genuinely acting and behaving in a way that would have left the Casino Bosses in no doubt that she was exhibiting signs of possible mental illness and therefore lacked capacity to make informed decisions and they still persisted in exploiting her then I think good luck to her and I hope she wins. Its all very well that the Casino switches dealers regularly but it is clear that the Casino did notice her as there started offering perks and luxeries to keep her there. I think that they would have been watching her.

If however, she was not behaving in a way that would make her look any different from the average highrolling punter then the Casino should win the case.

I wonder how she could prove her case though? Is there any CCTV footage? Has she any witnesses? I don't think we can truly make a judgement on who is right and wrong with the limited infomation in the article.

There are cameras in every part of the casino where gambling is taking place. Whether someone saw her or not, I really dont know. According to the linked article it says:

During one five-day gambling jag at Resorts in June 2005, Taveras says, she existed on nothing but orange juice and Snickers bars that the staff gave her.

Now, that happened a few years ago, so one has to wonder if anyone offered her anything this time around.

On the fifth day, she said, a dealer told her to go home because she appeared exhausted and unable to keep track of her cards.

Again, one has to wonder if this happened in this case. It would be interesting to know the policy the casino has regarding the well being of its patrons.

 

[punisher73]

Exile wrote:

I mean, doesn't it depend entirely on your ability to establish beyond reasonable doubt that the casino knew you were a gambling addict?

NO, not if it's a civil lawsuit. At that level it is only "perponderence of the evidence" which in effect means that you only have to "tip the scales" slightly in your favor to win. That is the reason you will sometimes have a person found not-guilty in a court of law, but responsible (guilty) in a civil suit.

The bigger question is, what will happen if she DOES win? How will the courts award damages? Does she have an exact amount of money she has lost? How much has she won? Will this open the door for other people filing this type of lawsuit.

I personally don't feel that the case has merit, anymore than the person suing McDonalds for him getting fat did. It will be interesting to see the results.