You may think that building above is Sunset Station. It even says it on the side. But, according to the paternalistic Las Vegas Review-Journal, it is just “a Henderson casino.” This uncommon daintiness from a bunch of self-styled macho men came in the context of a thwarted shooting at the Station Casinos gem. Thanks to our nation’s insane infatuation with firearms, Allison Howlett was able to arm herself with24 (!) guns, with which she motored over to Sunset Station, either intent on killing a lot of people or getting gunned down by police—casino security being no damn help in dangerous situations—or both.
Amazingly, local law enforcement was able to apprehend Howlett in the casino’s parking garage with only one shot being fired. We say amazingly because the cops were otherwise so addled that they alternately identified Howlett as a man and a woman. Transgenderism is apparently a new and difficult concept for Vegas cops to grasp. (Another testimonial to Nevada‘s fine educational system.) The femme fatale was initially booked for “making a threat related to an act of terrorism, assault with a deadly weapon constituting domestic violence, grand larceny of a motor vehicle, grand larceny of a gun, resisting a public officer with a firearm and other offenses.”
Compounding the apparent constabulatory ineptitude, it turns out that the FBI had been keeping tabs on Howlett for an unspecified number of years and even had her on tape making violent threats in 2024. Oh, and Howlett owns a staggering 50 firearms, one for every state in the union. Hewlett was also keeping a stock of grenade launchers and silencers, too. In other words, just your average Nevadan. We’re surprised the R-J editorial board hasn’t started a defense fund on her behalf … but it’s early yet.
By Thursday, the R-J had decided to drop the pretense of delicacy and prominently identified Sunset Station (above) as the gunplay scene. It also grumbled that Hewlett “was not charged Wednesday with making a threat related to an act of terrorism.” (They’ve really been pushing the terrorism angle.) According to Las Vegas Metro, “Allison stated that everyone is out to get her and are setting her up.” There’s a lot of that going around. Her plea ought to especially be music to the ears of the paranoid R-J braintrust, as maladjusted a bunch of white elitists as you’ll ever encounter.
Had Howlett not been spending so much on guns, she might have been able to afford a decent lawyer, instead of having to fall back on a public defender. She’ll make a target-rich environment for the prosecution, having previously threatened to gun down homeless people or go postal on the Las Vegas Strip and its tourists.
Perhaps the R-J was pussyfooting around this casino-mayhem story because it might otherwise spoil Station Casinos’ 50th anniversary weekend. Both the R-J and Las Vegas Sun (and Las Vegas Weekly, too) have been all-in on that feel-good narrative, and understandably so. One breathless R-J piece showcased the new Station corporate logo and it’s thoroughly ‘meh.‘ Whoever whipped this graphic up for the Feritta Brothers stole his paycheck. Anyway, we’re glad as heck that the community dodged a reprise of the Mandalay Bay Massacre, even if this latest imbroglio also leaves us with more questions that answers.
Although the gambling-oriented press has largely and quickly dropped the ball, a few are keeping tabs on the expanding story of last weekend’s tribal-casino shakedown. Seems that Idaho was also the scene of some menacing activity, in addition to Oklahoma, Michigan and Texas. While the FBI is AWOL on the case (an interstate crime if ever there was one), police have been active and characterize what went down as “a coordinated hoax.” As chillingly reported by one vigilant outlet, “The casinos in the four states received what is believed to be a coordinated series of bomb threats. The calls reportedly arrived almost simultaneously at several locations in the U.S., separated by thousands of miles, in some cases.” All the eight casinos targeted were tribal ones, which gives an ugly veneer of racism to the (as-yet-unknown) motivation of the terrorist(s). Whatever the reason for this crime spree, law enforcement is going to have its hands full solving it.
Stupid Politician Tricks. This week’s contestant hails from Illinois. It’s state Senate President Don Harmon (D). He got into bed with outlaws. Specifically, an illegal gambling Web site called Modo. This is a Florida-based site that Arizona has deemed a “felony criminal enterprise.” It has been cease-and-desisted in the Land of Lincoln for operating in violation of the Illinois Criminal Code. Even so, Harmon’s PAC, Friends of Don Harmon took money from Modo shortly before the state came down on it. Fifty dimes, to be exact.
This isn’t Harmon’s first brush with infamy. Also, not content to play the illegal side of the street, Harmon’s PAC pocketed $250,000 from the Sports Betting Alliance, a lobbying group of iGaming forces for whom Modo probably couldn’t die soon enough. Backpedaling in order to cover his ass, Harmon said he would give the tainted Modo money to charity. Piling hypocrisy upon cupidity, a Harmon spokesman prated, “Senate President Harmon has long been among the most skeptical voices in Springfield as to the wisdom of putting a slot machine in every Illinoisan’s pocket, and he remains so today.” Springfield, huh? We did detect a close resemblance between Harmon and one Homer Simpson. D’oh!
No story is getting bigger play today than the sinking off the Alabama coast of former casino riverboat Argosy VI. Erstwhile gambling venue for Lawrenceburg, Indiana and souvenir of the days when casinos had to cruise, Argosy VI was sent to Davey Jones’ Locker yesterday to form part of a manmade reef. The sea cocks were opened ,and it was down, down and away for the vessel. It’s a far more evocative fate for the ship than the alternative: being sold for scrap. She’s now 60 feet underwater, if you feel like diving on her, although we wouldn’t recommend it. Rest in peace, Argosy VI. (By the way, Florida has a very different way of building up reefs: It dumps illegal slot machines on the ocean floor. Some would call that littering.)