Many outlaws have been trying to outsmart casinos since the first one was established. They devise elaborate plans, team up, and use all sorts of technology and unthinkable means to organize the biggest heists of all time.
While making up a strategy on cheating in a card game sounds manageable, one would think that there is nothing that can be done regarding roulette. The game, whether it be online roulette or the land-based version, is a game that depends solely on luck, there are no big game strategies you could use to win and all that’s left for the player is pray the game falls into the right pocket. So how could anyone organize a roulette scam when it all depends on pure luck? Well, many hustles have managed to do it, and you’re about to find out how.
The Most Massive Teaming Up
Believe it or not, Ohio Casino Control Commission in 2012 suspected that a New York crime ring of 50 to 70 people was trying to rip off casinos playing at roulette tables. How did they do it? Some of them would play with bets as low as $1, while others would distract the croupier.
A different team would then swipe casino chips, take them to public restrooms and pass them to another team who would return to the tables and either use them to play again or cash them out. Each of them was taking $1000-$2000 and they would operate in different states. Only a small number of them were caught and faced strict penalties, while others are still on the run.
The Smart Eastern Europeans
This is one of the best roulette scams involving an advanced technology, more precisely a laser scanner which was embedded in their phones. This technology helped them scan the roulette wheel through their phones and enabled them to calculate the speed of the ball and predict in which pocket the ball will fall. They managed to swipe approximately $2 million but got caught.
This did not stop them from keeping the money, as the judge eventually freed them because there was no law against casino cheating.
The Radio Roulette Ball into a Pack of Cigarette
One of the most sophisticated, well-thought and engineering-challenged scam planning of all times is the radio roulette ball that happened in the early 70s. A French roulette croupier was interested in engineering, more precisely, radio, and this inspired him to use that hobby to make more money at his employer’s expense. So he teamed up with his sister-in-law and brother to test the security first, then proceeded to engineer a roulette ball with a weightless radio receiver and a cigarette pack with a transmitter in it. He switched the ball, his brother placed the bets and his sister-in-law played on the next table with the pack on her. This mechanism was designed to trigger the ball to fall in certain numbers and made them over a million before they got caught and arrested.