For the past few weeks I’ve been going to this website called www.centralcasino.com and playing 21. I never bet more than 10 bucks on a single game and I take my time. So it’s usually pretty fun with few losses or gains, just something to kill the time and nobody really gets hurt. But I’m sorta new to this and am kinda worried about the legality.
I know that gambling is illegal, so what stops the government from going to that website, looking at the people on there, tracking down my computer, kicking down my front door, and arresting me. Perhaps to make an example out of me to intimidate other hard core gamblers like myself. Or am I just being a worry wort? I’ve done a search on these forums for an answer and I can’t really find one on point.
Aside from any question as to the legalities involved, it’s simply not a good investment of police time and resources.
I suppose they could if they really, really wanted to but they won’t. It is bad PR and they would have to do the same thing to thousands of other people. It simply isn’t worth it and would cost untold millions of dollars to follow through on all the people like yourself.
The first target would certainly be the casino itself and there are lots of similar ones as well.
It’s not going to happen especially since similar things are legal all over the country in real casinos.
For one thing most of these online casinos are setup “off shore”, and the US goverment has no jurisdiction over them. So they can’t go, and get the records of who is playing. Also as stated above it would be a waste of resources with little gain.
-Otanx
You still might have the government going to that website, looking at the people on there, tracking down your computer, kicking down your front door, and arresting your for not reporting your winnings when you file your tax return.
Where is actual online gamling illegal though?
Online gambling is a very gray area, as is much of internet law. It is illegal to set up an internet casino based in the United States, but it hasn’t yet been determined whether it’s legal for U.S. citizens to gamble online at offshore casinos.
From this site: http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/278-11252005-575298.html
Of course, our government can make it rather inconvenient for you to gamble online. The increased refusal of credit card companies and banks to honor payments to online casino sites is an example. It’s just not clear whether they are acting legally when they do so and nobody wants to be the test case in court.
Unless and until the federal government or individual states begin passing laws making it illegal to do gamble offshore via the internet, your only concern is to insure that you declare and pay taxes on your winnings. As with any gambling winnings, you can offset the winnings by losses up to the amount of your winnings, but you’d better have accurate records.
uh, gambling is illegal? This is news to me.
I thought it was in some states but not others? I know there are a lot of casinos on Native American reservations, which have different rules, but not all of them are, right?
Why would you think it’s illegal for credit card companies to refuse transactions, especially transactions that are intended to fund potentially illegal activities? The reason so many credit card companies refuse to allow cardholders to fund internet gaming accounts is because of a number of lawsuits seeking to have such debts declared illegal under various state and federal laws and therefore void and uncollectable.
See Cillasi’s post just above yours referencing the Wire Wager Act.
Note that it requires the use of wires. So presumably under the plain text of the law a 100% wireless internet connection would be legal. There has been at least one conviction under the Act, but it was of someone operating an internet casino as opposed to a player. I’m not aware of any Americans who have been convicted under any state or federal statute for being a player.
I saw that, but the OP made it sound like gambling is just outright illegal, whether on the internet or not. This is what I was questioning. Did he mean he knows it is illegal in his state?
In my question I was asking about federal law and it didn’t really occur to me that other states may be at odds with a national law that outlawed gambling. I still know it’s illegal in my state of Texas. Here, all gambling is illegal unless you’re the state (aka the lottery) or a church/charity…which has always sorta struck me as ironic.
From the responses I’ve gotten it seems like the answer is that “yeah, it’s illegal to gamble online according to federal law (albeit untested) and also depending on what state you’re in, but either way they’re not going to enforce it because it’s too time consuming, expensive, etc…”
Although, the comment made about the IRS somehow getting the records of those who have made a profit by winning and not reporting it is rather scary. In terms of historical governmental agencies that I would not want to tangle with the IRS ranks third on the list, the next is the Gestopo and then the highest…the US Postal Service, have you seen the penalities for commiting a crime regarding them? Draconian I say.
Here are some discussions of the issues raised in this thread:
http://www.gamblingandthelaw.com/internet_gambling.html
http://www.law.duke.edu/journals/dltr/articles/2003dltr0016.html
http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/cybercrime/crimes.html#IXe
http://www.ipmall.info/hosted_resources/crs/97-619_041129.pdf
IANAL but if online gambling were truly illegal, the Feds would have arrested someone already to make an example of them. Instead they have browbeat the banks and credit card companies into not dealing with online casinos.
Cite that the feds have been involved in the decisions of banks and credit card companies to disallow transactions with online gaming sites?
And the US trying to ban online gambling is most likely a WTO violation. Not that it would help you if you were indeed arrested.
I’d have to hunt up the cite, but the AG has informed banks that online gambling is illegal and that there can be consequences if they allow transactions to/from gaming cites. I’ll look it up and give you a definative resource.
THanks for the info. The fact that an average citizen who gambles online really can’t get arrested put my fears to rest. Oh, and really good articles GFactor. Not exactly light bediside reading, but very informative.