The burden of risk in this credit relationship falls not on the provider, but on you the consumer. For the casino, providing credit entails no real risk. The “credit” is really only a prepaid opportunity to gamble. Sure, you might win some of the casino’s money. But it’s in the business of extending credit because the games are constructed to make sure that, in the long run, you lose. When a Rolls-Royce dealer sells you a $100,000 Silver Cloud on credit, he’s risking a valuable car. When a casino provides you with $100,000 in credit, it’s risking a seat at the blackjack table.
The casino is also risking bad debt, of course, but gamblers tend to be conscientious. Partly it’s the myth of the guys with flattened noses and cauliflower ears. Many Toronto gamblers know the story of the carpet king who stiffed one of the Las Vegas casinos after a disastrous session at craps. Before long the carpet king receives a visit from two well-dressed gentlemen. One of them opens a briefcase, withdraws an electronic sensor, and sweeps the room. The other, satisfied the place is not bugged, says, “At eight-fifteen each weekday morning your thirteen-year-old daughter leaves your house by the side door. She walks down Palmcrest Court to Sheppard, and waits for the 164 bus …” Soon afterwards the carpet king holds a warehouse liquidation sale, enabling him to settle his account. The story is almost certainly apocryphal, but it helps explain the casinos’ enviable record of debt recovery.
Many of the biggest losers are compulsive gamblers for whom the threat of being cut off is motivation enough. A New Jersey builder, David Zarin, became a regular at Resorts soon after it opened. The casino brought him one marker after another, and Zarin signed his name again and again. In 1980 alone, Resorts extended him $13.4-million in credit. Sometimes he won, sometimes he lost; before long he owed a sum in seven figures. Resorts threatened criminal action but didn’t really want him in jail. He had the money in bricks and mortar, and he’d be able to liquidate his holdings more easily on the street than in prison. They told him what a jerk he was, and gave him more markers to sign. May as well have him on the hook for $3-million as $1.5-million. If he paid anything they’d be ahead of the game. If he paid the whole shot, why not take him for all he was worth? If he stiffed them, they’d have a bigger writeoff.
The Division of Gaming Enforcement, in the course of an audit, came upon Zarin’s returned markers. According to New Jersey law he had not just failed to pay Resorts, he’d broken the law. By making markers negotiable instruments rather than promissory notes, New Jersey had made every judge and law-enforcement officer in the state an extension of the casino’s collection department. Quite against the wishes of the casino Zarin had stiffed, the attorney general indicted him on charges of theft by deception.
When credit players do renege, the casinos have no legal recourse outside their own state jurisdictions. A Toronto sports-caster, Pat Marsden, stopped payment on two $10,000 postdated cheques he’d issued to the Dunes in Las Vegas to cover gambling losses. The Dunes took him to court, but a judge in Ontario ruled Marsden did not have to honour the cheques. Since casino gambling was outlawed by the Criminal Code, the cheques were an illegal consideration. The Dunes had no more grounds than would a drug pusher who’d found that a stop-payment had been put on the cheque he’d accepted in return for an ounce of cocaine. The same thing happened when a Florida gambler named Harry Rozany put a stop-payment on his $100,000 cheque to the Tropicana in Atlantic City. A Florida judge ruled he did not have to make good the money.
Easy credit contributes handsomely to every casino’s bottom line — more than one gambler has wakened with a hangover and the awful realization he’s going to have to mortgage his house — but a big cash player is a dream. He deposits cash directly into the cage. In return he’s issued chips, which usually end up back in the casino’s possession. No paperwork, no time lag, no stop-payment cheques. The casinos compete fiercely for high-rolling cash players. Molony was well known at Caesars as soon as it became clear he wasn’t merely someone who’d blown his life savings. He was someone who came back. His free room turned into a lavish suite; the van to and from Philadelphia became a limousine.
Casino executives are part bloodhound, part monitor, part schmooze. The idea is to sniff out money and establish a “personal relationship” with those who have it. The idea is to look after them so they won’t take their action next door. The idea is to get the money — every dollar. “Hey, Mr. C. How are you? Great to see you. How’s Janet? How about those Giants, pulling it out in the fourth quarter. Listen, what can I get you? Come sign in at the cage. The Chateau Margaux’s in your suite if you’d like to relax. Do me a favour, Mr. C. Tell me what I can do for you.” The credit executive has accessed the computer: spouse’s name, anniversary, favourite casino game, favourite food, favourite drink, favourite sport, favourite team, it’s all there, right down to Mr. C’s handicap at golf. The warmth is that of a sunning snake, the smile is purely transactional — hypocrisy of the first order. Crazy thing is, it works.
Pity the poor credit executives at Caesars trying to get a fix on Molony, radiating geniality, really working at it. “Good to see you, Mr. M. Have a good trip? How’s everything up in Toronto? Those Blue Jays are really coming on.” This was no twenty-thousand-credit-line jerkoff expecting to be treated like King Farouk. This was sixty thousand cash who blew every cent in a fever and, instead of slinking out, came back a week later with ninety thousand and a determined look. Tuna like that, play him right, it’s promotion time. In that sense a casino is no different from an ad agency or a law firm. The crucial question is whether, if you left, you could take the business with you.
Trouble is, Mr. M. didn’t get off on the bullshit that worked so well with Mr. C. He obviously wanted no inquiries of any kind. His room card said, “address on file in casino,” but his patron reference card in the casino cage said only “Brian Maloney, Toronto.” Lots of heavy hitters liked to play it low key, but what made the guy tick? Since a good deal rode on the answer, this became the million-dollar question. Coiffed, well-tailored men huddled in perplexed consultation. “What’s with the guy on Baccarat 2?” An overweight shmuck in a rack suit and shoes that look secondhand. Can we redo your suite for you, Mr. M., different colour scheme maybe? Get the decorator in? Trouble is, he never spends time in his suite except to change his shirt or phone his girlfriend or, when the tension gets to him, throw up in one of the marble bathrooms. How about we install the big screen so you can watch the ball games in comfort? No thanks, he mumbles through his moustache, looking toward the dice pit. Tickets to the Pointer Sisters, maybe? Great show, seen it half a dozen times myself. No thanks, he says. Little you-know-what, maybe? “The only lady I’m interested in,” he says, “is lady luck.” So what turns the guy on? Give him the look — anything goes — and ask in your most friendly, heartfelt tone: “We’re at your service, Mr. M. Sure there’s nothing at all we can do for you?”
Finally, finally, he says maybe there is something he wouldn’t mind. Not now, right now he wants to play. Maybe later. Later he might like something to eat.
You got it, Mr. M. What’ll it be? Nice dinner at Le Posh (“combines Art Deco ambience with exquisite European cuisine”)? Or the Hyakumi Japanese Steakhouse (“teppanyaki chefs prepare a seven-course dinner at tableside”)? You want some iced Dom Perignon waiting for you at the best table in Primavera (“northern Italian culinary delights with the setting of a Venetian palazzo”)? Name it, Mr. M., your wish is my command.
Ribs, he says. Barbequed ribs, no sauce, and a large Coke.
In Toronto, Molony was gambling more feverishly than ever. His monthly statement from Richardson’s, showing his stock transactions, ran to several pages. Every day after work he drove to the track. Some nights he played craps after the races, but Beck’s worries about surveillance made the game unpleasant and then something happened that made him wonder if he should be playing at all. One night Eli Koharski stepped out for a bite and returned to find Molony had won more than $20,000. Molony was impassive; Koharski couldn�
��t suppress his excitement.
“Jesus, Brian, realize how much you’ve got?”
“Not enough,” said Molony, throwing the dice.
Koharski’s reaction, and the reaction of another man at the game, made him realize the risk he was running. The other player was a dentist who tried several times to start a conversation. Molony deflected his questions but overheard him asking Beck who the big winner was — the guy with the bushy moustache. The last thing Molony wanted was to draw attention to himself. Besides, low stakes made the game pointless. It was a way to fill time rather than make the kind of money he needed. When the evening ended Molony counted his cash, tucked it in his trouser pocket, and headed home.
That was it for the crap game.
At four in the morning, Molony let himself into the apartment and phoned the Sportsline number in Buffalo for the latest scores. He hung up before the tape ended — that gave him something to look forward to when he got up. He did the same thing with the race results in the newspaper, covering the names of the horses, revealing them one at a time from the bottom up. Didn’t finish last, didn’t finish second last…
Brenda stirred when he slipped into bed. “What time is it?”
“After one,” said Molony, giving her a kiss. “Go back to sleep.”
At eight-thirty he was at Bay and Richmond, perusing his accounts, instructing his credit officer, Steve Richardson, and making plans to get back to Atlantic City on the weekend. Through the spring and summer he continued to expand business at his post, attracting many new accounts to the branch. Harry Buckle had to admit that he shouldered an extraordinary workload. One afternoon Molony was meeting with a new customer when Beck phoned. The customer stepped out; Molony indicated he’d just be a moment.
“Here comes The Banker, moving up between —”
“I don’t have time. Just give them to me.”
“Dodgers thirty, Cardinals forty, Pirates pick, Padres pick, Reds eighty, Giants twenty. Orioles forty, Brewers twenty, Yankees forty, Twins twenty, White Sox pick, Red Sox twenty.”
“Give me the home teams in the National and the away teams in the American.”
“What’s this crap?”
“Do I have to send you a telegram?” said Molony. “All for the max.”
He was losing more heavily than ever to Beck and Colizzi and owed them almost $90,000. He bet with them individually, and jointly, imagining neither knew the other was taking his action on the side. They let him continue so long as he paid them $10,000 a week. Meanwhile he was using Epstein and another bookmaker as well, and was in debt to them. He financed his horse and sports bets, and his trips to Atlantic City, by ordering cash parcels at the branch and buying U.S. dollars next door at Friedberg’s.
Friedberg & Co. was owned by Federico Friedberg, a rotund, balding Viennese Jew. He had left Austria in 1938, at age nineteen, and lived in France and Belgium before moving to Uruguay in 1951. He spent twenty years as a currency dealer in Montevideo, where he changed his name from Fritz to Federico. He knew six languages and every currency. Spend your working life in the money business and sooner or later you see just about everything. There’s certainly nothing unusual about a young man phoning to get a U.S.-dollar quotation and appearing a few minutes later with a bank draft.
Molony dropped into Friedberg’s three or four times a week, buying U.S. cash with a certified cheque or a draft he himself had signed. No one ever asked for identification. Molony, for his part, never engaged in small talk, never lingered, never counted the money. He stuffed it in his suit and hurried out. One day he had just picked up $40,000 U.S. when a bank customer walked in.
“What are you doing here, Brian? Supporting the competition?”
“Late for a meeting,” said Molony. “Speak to you later.”
He was petrified the customer had seen the cash and would let slip his identity. Friedberg’s, however, took a piece of every dollar he changed. He was changing as much as $200,000 a week, a goose who laid golden eggs. Still, his hurried manner, the frequency of his visits, and the amount he was turning over made him the subject of speculation. Federico Friedberg kept a safety deposit box at Bay and Richmond. One day he happened to notice the mystery man working at the branch. The word got around; the clerks at Friedberg’s, among themselves, started referring to Molony as “Mr. CIBC.”
Look up at the ceiling in any casino and you’ll see mirrors or oneway glass. Behind the glass is another world. The surveillance department of a casino is a closely guarded secret, unknown even to other employees. The monitor room is mission control, with a bank of screens on one wall, phones, a computer terminal, facilities for videotaping, and shelves for storing the tapes. Some things had to be taped: the passage of slot money across the casino floor, the locked chip wells on the tables at closing time, the count room. The date and time of day were automatically recorded. Other things were taped at the casino’s discretion: any heavy action, in case of dispute; any suspected dishonesty on the part of a player or an employee; anything that might eventually end up in court.
Watching the games in the monitor room, or live from the catwalks through the one-way glass, you got a unique perspective on a player. If you needed to find out about him you simply accessed the computer. Key in PF11 and you got the bank report — information obtained by the casino from the patron’s bank. PF5 gave you the central credit summary. PF8 gave you a summary of the player’s history at the casino — what he’d taken in markers, what markers he’d paid off, what cash he had deposited. PF9, a marker rating inquiry, gave you the same information that was attached to every marker issued down in the pit, including the player’s average bet, minutes played, win or loss, and his rating. Every player was rated on a scale of 1 to 6. A 6 was somebody who took markers and then walked with the chips, trying to look like he was generating big action in hopes of getting comped. The highest rating was a 1, somebody who played for consistently high stakes and put in long hours, like the portly guy who came from Toronto three or four times a month.
Every shift on surveillance you had to fill in a Game Observer’s Report, recording everything that happened while you were on duty:
Security call: servicemaster shampooing rug in cage area.
Blackjack #58: Green play. Player making big bets on impulse. Inconsistent betting pattern.
Cage scan. Tape 129 stops. Tape 197 starts.
You paid such careful attention that you got to know the casino personnel, and many players, in a strangely intimate way. You might bump into a floorman at Pleasantville Plaza and he was so familiar — you knew his nickname and what brand he smoked and which cocktail girl he had his eye on — you were tempted to say hello. And only then remembered he didn’t know you from Adam. He had no way of realizing you even worked for the same company.
Weird job, surveillance. Using the joystick, you could zoom in and read the watch on a player’s wrist, then back off and pan one end of the casino. Using the computer, you could find out all about him. Using the recorders, you could tape him for posterity. He didn’t even know you were there. Watching the players and dealers, and the people who watched the players and dealers, and the people who watched them, you sometimes got a funny feeling. Up there in the ceiling, invisible and omniscient, you felt a bit like God.
July 25. Caesars Atlantic City. Frank Hines.
8 p.m. Baccarat #3. Brian Maloney on game. Has $45,000. Has received $90,000 in markers. Bets up to $10,000.
2:30 a.m. Baccarat. Maloney still on Game #3.
Sherry Brydson was finding it no simple matter to transform a run-down hotel into an elegant women’s club. Barb Elson, her partner, was experienced in dealing with contractors, but the project was huge. There were scores of decisions to be made each day. The first architect didn’t work out and had to be replaced. Strikes in the building trades brought lengthy delays, and the overruns kept mounting.
Brydson was also puzzled by the bank’s attitude. Strange that the CIBC took so little interest. Molony some
times dropped by to see how things were shaping up, but no one else seemed to care how many tons of concrete had been poured, how membership plans were developing, when they hoped to open the doors. If she were a banker, wouldn’t she have wanted assurance that things were proceeding? The project was eating money; her loans were growing; the bank now had a substantial stake in the club. Yet when she needed more money she had only to alert Brian, who wrote downtown and obtained an increased limit. She didn’t even have to outline her plans to more senior personnel.
At least Molony seemed to understand what she was doing. He was supportive and helpful, and had become friends with Stu Butts, her lawyer. In August Brydson invited Brian and Brenda to her cottage for the weekend, along with Butts and his wife, Barb Elson and her husband, and another couple. Molony didn’t want to go — two days on an island in Georgian Bay without telephones, ball games, or horses promised to be hell — but he felt he had to accept for the sake of customer relations. Maybe Brenda would enjoy herself, provided she didn’t choke on the Asian food. At least it would be nice to spend time with Stu Butts and his wife. Every now and then the four of them got together socially.
Before driving up north, Molony stopped in to see Nick Beck. “Give me the home team in every Saturday and Sunday game,” he said, in the storage room at the dress shop. “I’ll take all the underdogs in the CFL games.” He phoned Colizzi and said, “I won’t be around this weekend. I want the one horse in every race, both days, both tracks. Also the one-and-one doubles and reverse wheels. And the one horse in every race at Aqueduct.”
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