Gambling

Shortly after 9 a.m. last Saturday, amid the madness of the NCAA men's basketball tournament, a man dressed entirely in black studied the electronic board flashing point spreads at the Palms Casino Resort. He had already wagered more than $7,000 that morning, placing half a dozen bets on the Internet and in casinos on sporting events large and small, from arena football to college ice hockey to women's college basketball.

Two decades ago, real estate mogul Randy Black turned this blip on the Arizona border into a boomtown when he opened the first of four casinos. Nearly 1 million visitors a year followed, and hotels, restaurants and stucco homes seemed to sprout from sand. "It seemed to be one of those things that 'Geez, it's just going great. It's never going to end,' " said Victor Kotalion, who left Las Vegas in 1990 for this arid patch off Interstate 15.

Richard Milanovich, who doesn't like to gamble because he doesn't like losing money, grins broadly from the podium at the Spa Hotel and Casino in downtown Palm Springs as he gives away a million dollars of the casino's gambling profits. "Oh, this is so much fun," he says, announcing a $150,000 donation to the Palm Springs Fire Department.

THE day that Marilyn Lancelot won the biggest jackpot of her life, she left the casino in Yuma, Ariz., with every penny of the $4,000 that had poured out of the slot machines. This time she knew that she would never gamble again. She was right, although not for the reasons she thought. The next day, seven police cars appeared in her Phoenix driveway and she was taken out of her house in handcuffs.

MONTREAL -- Players on the men's tennis tour have been the targets of anonymous phone calls in which they were asked to try to influence the outcome of matches, according to doubles star Bob Bryan, a member of the ATP Player Council. "I don't know of any players that have ever gambled on tennis," he said Tuesday at the Rogers Cup, a Masters Series tournament. "But there have been some anonymous calls to players' rooms with some monetary offerings. "I know that.

In the 1960s, a group called Concerned Citizens held barbecue dinners, car washes and fashion shows to help bring indoor plumbing to the Chumash Indian reservation here. The display of charity was not an isolated occurrence. Year after year, merchants donated toys and clothing to Indian children. Volunteers decorated the sparse tribal hall each Christmas and baked cookies for Chumash families.

When Dan Montecalvo talks about the night of March 31, 1988, his Boston accent flattens and his voice slows as he gives his account of his wife's murder: Montecalvo had just returned from an evening stroll with his wife, Carol, when she entered their Glendale home alone. A moment later there was a startled shout and gunfire. As Montecalvo rushed inside, he was seized from behind and shot in the back as the assailants fled.

Barack Obama has warned about the dangers of gambling -- that it carries a "moral and social cost" that could "devastate" poor communities. As a state senator in Illinois, he at times opposed plans to expand gambling, worrying that it could be especially harmful to low-income people. Today, those views are posing a problem for Obama in the gambling mecca of Nevada, which holds its presidential nominating caucuses Saturday. While his top rival, Sen.

In the wake of Pete Rose's expulsion from baseball for betting and George Steinbrenner's admission that he gave $40,000 to a gambler, sports and law enforcement officials say they are concerned about the growing influence of gambling on college and professional leagues.

For California's casino customers, it's the real wild card -- a secret that the Native American gambling industry holds close to the vest. The mystery concerns the payout rates for slot machines: How much of the money pumped into the thousands of chirping contraptions -- the life's blood of the state's 50 Indian casinos -- is returned to players as winnings? Casino executives have the answer, but they tend to guard it like the house vault. State regulators are clueless.

With the state bracing for billions of dollars in budget shortfalls, a group of casinos is offering California leaders a stake in a new pot of money if they allow Internet poker sites to set up business in the state. A consortium including the Morongo Band of Mission Indians and the Commerce Casino plans to take the idea to the state Legislature next month. The two would be among the gambling interests seeking to operate poker websites if the proposal were approved. Gambling industry experts say $347 billion annually is wagered online globally, with millions of U.S. residents giving their credit card numbers to Internet sites so they can bet on poker games they play on their personal computers against other gamblers who are doing the same.

A federal appeals court Wednesday gave the go-ahead for enforcement of a ban on electronic bingo machines in California while a group of charities continues a legal challenge to the law. FOR THE RECORD: The headline for an article about a ban on California's bingo machines that ran in Thursday's Section A incorrectly said the ban had been upheld. A federal appeals court did not rule on the ban itself. It lifted an injunction on enforcement of the ban. The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down an injunction that had blocked sheriffs from unplugging the games and set the stage for the devices to be shut down in three weeks unless there is another appeal.

It's that time of year again. There's a chill in the air. Holiday shopping goes into overdrive. And Los Angeles police warn residents that con artists are out in force, eager to separate unsuspecting victims from their money. A case in point: Los Angeles Police Department officers arrested eight people between the ages of 27 and 67 over the weekend downtown on suspicion of conspiracy to commit gaming in connection with a shell-game operation. The suspects set up shop in the 500 block of Los Angeles Street, said Lt. Paul Vernon.

This is what a recession looks like at Southern California's tribal casinos: Nearly every seat at the 25-cent slot machines is filled. Gamblers wait three deep around the cheapest blackjack tables. The reels on the penny slot machines spin almost without interruption. The Saturday night crowd at the San Manuel Indian Bingo and Casino in San Bernardino County reflects what gaming operators say is the new reality of tribal casinos: The visitors are still streaming in, but they have cut way back on spending.

A casual horse player's guide to parimutuel wagering, especially as it pertains to the Breeders' Cup World Championships on Friday and Saturday at Santa Anita. . . . The money trail First-time track-goers may wonder where their money goes. Parimutuel wagering is different from regular sports betting, in which the house (a bookie or legal sports book) generally takes a 10% cut referred to as juice. At the track your wager is like a stock transaction: A $2 bet ticket buys a share in the horse's performance.

The economy is healthy when it comes to betting on the NFL. "Football is America's game," said John Avello, executive director of race and sports operations at the Wynn Resort in Las Vegas. "People seem to have money for it. "Maybe the bettor thinks he can hit eight of 10 straight bets. But we anticipated the bettors being here [for the first weekend of the NFL season], and they were." Avello said the Wynn saw action from the squares betting $10 to the whales betting thousands.

Let's say you're playing poker and you need one more diamond for a flush. The dealer turns a card, reveals a diamond and you win the hand. Was it skill or luck? The answer is affecting the fates of people across the country accused of breaking anti-gambling laws -- people like Kevin Raley of Colorado. As an engineer, Raley finds that the mathematics of poker come easily, and he's pretty good at keeping a blank face. Reading other people, though, is something he's always working on. "It's something I'm better at today than I was five years ago," said Raley.

Horse racing, in a comeback bid, is headed for a casino near you. Beginning this weekend, horse racing fans can place bets and watch televised races at the Commerce Casino, the first new off-track betting site approved under a statewide initiative to whip up the struggling horse racing industry. At the new site, gamblers will be able to bet at electronic kiosks and follow races from across the country on a bank of 26 television screens.

The house is usually a sure bet in California poker casinos. But five Los Angeles County card rooms could lose millions if two recreational poker players win a lawsuit challenging a popular jackpot promotion. Poker has long been allowed in California. But the state has warned casinos that the jackpots -- in which players can win thousands of dollars for losing -- are illegal lotteries.

The laid-off worker from Hunan province hung back from the baccarat table as his wife placed bets. He sipped water and explained how he justified traveling to this former Portuguese colony on China's southern coast -- the only place in the country where gambling is legal -- and blowing $450 in savings. "We are not rich, so we took a train to Guangzhou first, then we took a bus to Zhuhai," bordering Macao, said Zhang, 50, who gave only one name. "We are staying in a hotel that costs only $15 a day, and we eat from food vendors for no more than $3 a meal.