Bellagio needs to get serious about security. As has happened multiple times in the past, an armed robbery was conducted on the premises, this time at the poker cage, at 3:45 p.m. I wouldn’t say casino security stood idly by but they failed yet again to stop a brazen 
stickup of the Las Vegas Strip‘s top casino. Players, however, were not so oblivious. Actor James Woods was among the onlookers. Tweeted Woods, “a guy walks up with a gun and robs the cage thirty feet from us ten minutes ago.” Since the suspect was wearing a mask and looked like a forlorn member of Cirque du Soleil, one wonders if security was blind to this anomaly or simply absent. The bandit was so confident, he actually valet-parked his getaway car (subsequently abandoned). What if the gun-toting robber had been bent upon shooting people instead? It would have been the second epic fail of MGM Resorts International security in as many months.
“Those who commit crimes like this on the Strip will be hunted down and whatever amount of cash he got is not enough to face a lifetime in prison,” blustered Las Vegas Metro Captain John Pelletier. He said Metro was “comfortable and confident” it would get its man, never mind that he got through what passes for a security force at Bellagio. (Somebody needs to be given the sack forthwith.) I don’t know about you but I no longer feel safe at an MGM casino. That will remain the case until the company gets serious about screening for firearms on-property.
* Speaking of the dangers of gun violence in Las Vegas, an 20-something man had his life cut short when an argument outside the Four Queens Casino turned fatal. (Their is no issue in our society too trivial to be settled with gunplay.) Upon hearing the shot, busker John Deagan “stopped playing and looked over and people were running, so I ducked behind this pillar.” Throw in a shooting spree in downtown Reno and Nevada was experiencing an epidemic of violence yesterday. “When you heard it’s coming from above it reminds you of the guy shooting from Mandalay Bay,” said one witness to the Reno shootout in the casino corridor. “It’s scary, you know? This is the same kind of town.” Thankfully, there were no injuries.
Speaking of the Mandalay Bay massacre, some of its wounded victims worry that they’ll be excluded from compensation, currently prioritized for the families of those who died. “Requiring extensive medical records and ranking pain and suffering on a case-by-case basis would be time intensive,” tut-tuts the Las Vegas Sun. God forbid that justice should be dispensed in anything other than haste.
* It’s not every day that casino regulators go to bat as advocates for the casinos but that’s presently happening in Saipan, where a legislative committee has approved an $800,000 maximum fine for violations of casino law (a compromise, down from $5 million). Pointing to much lower fee maximums in the United States, the Commonwealth Casino Commission is pushing for, at most, a $250,000 cap, equal to Nevada’s. “We looked at Nevada, New Jersey, Singapore [$$70,422 maximum], Macao [$621,712 max], Australia and South Korea for how much they charge for personal violation versus a company violation,” said CCC Executive Director Edward Deleon Guerrero. “It is three times higher than any U.S. jurisdiction.” Politicians and regulators might find middle ground in a proposal by CCC member Juan M. Sablan, who pitched $500,000 as an acceptable figure. Whatever the dollar amount winds up being, the bottom line is the same: Don’t screw the pooch in Saipan.
