http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2...leged-gambling .

Great use of our police resources, Huh? Protect and serve

I bet that gun was legal except for the "gambling".

I didn't see anything about poker players? And the article didn't say what type of gambling it was.

Did I read it wrong?

No, you didn't. I read 10 articles about the bust and not one mentioned poker...

According to George Gordon, a spokesman for the Alpharetta Department of Public Safety, Pepperoni's Tavern closed its doors to customers Monday night, at which point invited guests showed up and rearranged the place so that they could place cash bets on the NCAA basketball tournament.

I know a lot of the guys who were at the event.

Typical ex soviet country

Any idea if this was a calcutta they were doing or just cash bets?

I don'twant to give too many details yet, as case is pending. I would hate to cause any issues for friends of mine. I just wanted to speak to the general silliness that this is how police resources are allocated. I am sure that with a public vote, even in a conservative place like Georgia, that 80% of the public would have no problem with this gambling activity.

If it were just brackets I think people would sympathize but if they were betting games they won't get as much support.

I can confirm that it was a Calcutta and Josh Arieh was there as he has posted this on twitter.

They must have been foreigners. Any local would know that this can be avoided with a few gifts to the right comrade.

So, you are saying that the police should pick and chose which laws they enforce? Personally, I think most laws that don't injure/harm another person should be abolished but, if a law is on the books then it should be enforced, at least occasionally.

A huge amount of revenue is generated through arrests like this. I talked to some of the local Atlanta-area police officers last week and he claimed that they weren't allowed to pay officers through seizing valuables but bragged that 100% of their expenses were paid that way.

I asked him how he felt about a few friends getting together to play poker and he said they didn't care about that. He said they were focused on organized crime and people running gambling businesses. With 100+ people that sounds like exactly that this was.

You'd have to be out of your mind to show up at a place like this with cash.

By the way less than 80% (0% actually) spoke up that they felt that police resources were being misallocated.

I used to play a lot of home poker games in the area of this bust before moving away. I knew someone there. I'm told there were multiple Calcutta pools, the house took no juice, and all cash was seized, regardless of it being in action or not.

Those that had cash seized had to agree to forfeit it as a part of their walk. Employees of the bar have other minor penalties, like service work, as part of agreement.

It sounds like a complete and total cash grab to me based on this story. I am thinking about writing up a story based on my source. If I am wrong or there is more to add, feel free to correct me. I want to make sureI know as much of the story as possible.

I've seen examples where truck drivers suspected of driving with cartel drug money stashed aboard have been allowed to walk away from the scene with no arrest provided they turn the funds over to the police on the spot. With an arrest the seized money goes to the state but if it's turned over with no arrest the money goes to the local police force. Insane laws that are justified by the argument that police forces aren't given enough resources. If they didn't use that money buying military tanks perhaps they'd have a little extra for overtime.

JHC why don't they just pay off the local authorities and have their games. Write it off as the the cost of doing business. Not a new idea to avoid raids. Are they new at this or what? Everyone just wants some money to let it roll.

Yes, they should be able to exercise discretion given finite resources they have they should be doing meth interdiction, theft, and crimes of violence. Busting suburbanites doing what every other american in every other venue is doing is horse crap.

I wonder how many officers put in a bracket in a pool at the station...

Police should not be used as revenue generation force because it fundamentally erodes public trust in the institution.

I don't think it's that easy any longer to just pay people off

Do illegal things, get caught and then go to jail. I see nothing wrong with the picture here. You took a risk, it didn't work out. Better luck next time.

i don't think they have poker there

Well it certainly has not changed around these parts, I know that much, but you may be right about where you are and maybe other places too IDK!

That is what they have become. The police choose what laws to enforce. You would think they would go after a lot of the big time drug dealers but they don't always do that. Now if they had a ton of cops they would probably go after them if they saw it. If the cop is alone they may just ignore it. The reason is they want to go home at the end of the day.

Going after the gambling is easy money. I bet a bunch of the money mysteriously vanishes.