In Baton Rouge, it is not hard to find a place to legally gamble.
Down by the Mississippi River, Casino Rouge and Argosy Casino offer patrons hundreds of opportunities to gamble any day of the year and any hour of the day.
Of course, with Louisiana State University being minutes away from the casinos, students often make the trip to try their luck at picking up some spending cash.
But if a casino does not fit the needs of the students, or if it is filled with too much smoke or is too noisy, opportunities arise elsewhere.
At LSU and other higher education campuses throughout the country, illegal betting on sports among students runs rampant, and it is not just the typical “I’ll bet you five dollars my team wins” kind of bets.
Two student bookies said activities ranging from student bookies to in-home blackjack tables to illegal football parlay betting cards (betting on three games at a time) are commonplace at LSU. They are actually commonplace on nearly every college campus in America.
A study performed by researchers from several universities around the country said 33 percent of male students and 15 percent of female students gamble at least once a week.
Not only are the illegal betting outlets available, but they are easy to find.
Whether it be a bookie in a dorm or a student handing out parlay cards at his apartment, all that is needed is a phone and a certain level of curiosity.
“When I first moved into my apartment my freshman year in college, I started hearing about betting on sports and playing parlay cards,” said Ben Dichiara, an LSU kinesiology junior who has bet in the past. “All I had to do was talk to my neighbor, and he set me up with his bookie, and I’ve been betting ever since.”
While betting on sports is illegal in 49 states, that does not stop students from trying to earn an extra buck.
“I’ve always had a huge interest in football,” said Blake Panzeca, an LSU junior. “So I figured it was a good way to try to make some easy money. Plus, it keeps me much more interested in the games that I bet on.”
And when betting happens on a college campus, it is not unusual for people to bet on the home team.
“A lot of people around here bet on LSU,” said an on-campus student bookie who withheld his name for fear of prosecution. “Once the team gets on a roll, people, I guess, just kind of catch a fever and go with their favorite team.”
Bookies, experienced and beginners, are continuing to pop up around LSU’s campus.
THE BEGINNER
The student bookie who spoke of people betting on the home team just got into the “game.”
After years of placing bets through illegal bookies, he figured it was his turn to take the bets and make his piece of the pie.
But he did not go in alone. He ventured into it with two friends about four months ago to limit the damages he would experience, if any.
“My friends and I had been talking about starting up a service,” the bookie said. “I had had a bookie for years and all kinds of different bookies. I was just trying really to help them out. Then they asked me if I wanted to just get in on it. And since everyone was only putting up a third of the costs, I thought it would be a good idea.”
The bookie said if his friends would not have gone in, he certainly would not have.
“Everyone splits the losses and proceeds by a third,” the bookie said. “So you’re not putting up the large bulk of it.” Early on, the bookie said he experienced some troubles with his service, mainly because in a college town it is hard to form a clientele base and even harder to get people to call their bets in on time.
“It’s hard to get really good clients that are in college,” the bookie said. “But when people lose, it hasn’t been a problem getting them to pay up.”
But what if it was a problem? What if a student made a $1,000 bet and refused to pay up?
The bookie said if money is not collected on each Tuesday when he makes his rounds to collect, there is not much he can do. Since he is in college, he said physical violence is not an option, and all he can do is stop taking bets from that person. It is common lore that professional bookies have employees for the sole purpose of forcefully getting clients to pay up with physical threats or actions.
“I just don’t want to get myself involved in situations like that too much,” the bookie said. “You get what you can out of them, and pretty much don’t take any more bets from them.”
The bookie said working in a college town does have its advantages, like easy, free advertising and reliable customers.
“What some people do is just go around and tell people they are taking bets,” the bookie said. “But the best way is just word of mouth. And the most important thing is to make sure you’ve got reliable people passing out your name to other reliable people. If you are a reliable person and you pay out, you’re not going to refer a friend that could possibly screw you over by not paying me. So, it usually works out.”
The bookie said it really is not hard to find people, whether knowledgeable in sports or not, willing to bet for the thrill of it.
“A lot of people like to bet on games,” the bookie said. “Sometimes they have good weeks and sometimes they have bad weeks.”
Winning or losing depends on the client, the bookie said, so the less knowledgeable, the better. And since a losing bet must pay an extra 10 percent of what the bet is, the odds are stacked in the bookie’s favor to come out on top.
“It just depends on what kind of guys you’ve got betting,” the bookie said. “But I think in the long run the odds are with you, because the juice (interest) is the hook. You have to win over 50 percent of your games to win. If someone places $2,000 and wins half of them, he’s down $200. So even if he goes 50-50, he’s down.”
This bookie has added another aspect to his moneymaking arsenal.
Because he also bets with a professional bookie, when people call him to put bets through with his bookie on his accounts, he takes on some of the bets, increasing his chances to make more money.
“Some people that bet are really, really bad bettors,” the bookie said. “So rather than putting them through my bookie, I just set them up and take a cut. That way, all of that won’t go on my account and handicap me, and on top of that, I’m getting juice on it. I don’t have to worry about getting their money for someone else.”
The bookie said he loves when people ask him what to bet on.
“Some of them don’t know they’re betting with me,” the bookie said. “That way I win it rather than my bookie, and on top of that, I don’t have to worry about my bettors giving me money for my account with my bookie.”
THE VETERAN
For another campus bookie, it has been business as usual around LSU for about three years, taking bets and handing out parlay cards almost every day, after setting up a solid clientele.
This bookie became hooked on gambling when he first went to the casino at the age of 18 for his brother-in-law’s bachelor party.
“I went inside using a fake ID,” the bookie said. “And before I knew it, I was up $40 and getting free drinks. I thought it was the best thing in the world.”
After that, the bookie did not return to the casino until he was 21, but the gambling craze was already in his blood.
He figured, if the casino was the house, and the “house always wins,” why shouldn’t he be the house?
So instead of going back to the casino while he was underage and risking arrest, the bookie said he and his roommate started a mini-casino of their own out of their apartment.
The bookie and his roommate put up $250 each to start a blackjack table, buying clay chips, the wood necessary to build a table, a felt cover for the table, numerous decks of casino-made cards, an automatic card shuffler and stools for the table.
Not only did the bookie provide the blackjack table, he also provided free beer and cigarettes, much like the casino. He said he wanted to make the experience as close to a casino as possible, if not better.
“We served them beer and cigarettes, and on some nights, we would have eight people at the table and other people waiting to play,” the bookie said.
The bookie said many people preferred playing at his apartment because the minimum bet per hand at his table was $3 rather than the standard $5 at a casino. Also, in order to “buy-in” to the game, a person had to purchase at least $40 worth of chips.
All in all, the bookie said the table was just like anything else – successful on some nights, and not so successful on others. He said that over four months of having a table, he and his roommate made a $1,100 profit, splitting it right down the middle between the two of them.
But the bookie said having a blackjack table in his house became taxing. People would call him at all hours of the night to open the table. And usually, he would oblige.
“The casino is open 24 hours-a-day, so I felt like I should be open at least throughout the night,” the bookie said. “After a while, it got old, and I was losing sleep because of it.”
The bookie said that is when he decided to start accepting sports bets.
“I still wanted to be the house,” the bookie said. “But now I didn’t have to stay up until 5 o’clock in the morning to make money.”
The bookie said he already had an advantage with clients because of all the people that played at his blackjack table.
“I had those clients and they told other people,” the bookie said. “And before I knew it, I had a solid base of clients betting every week.”
The bookie said he never has problems with people paying because he knows most of his clients, and if they want to get paid, they know they have to pay up.
RISKS AND REWARDS
Even though it may seem easy, this type of business and activity is considered illegal. But it certainly is not at the forefront for the LSU police and other police outlets.
LSUPD Capt. Mark Shaw said the department does not investigate many gambling crimes simply because the complaints are not there.
“We are just not seeing that kind of activity,” Shaw said. “There are no complaints regarding it.”
Shaw said when he first arrived at LSU years ago, there was an ongoing investigation for a gambling ring, but since then, it has not been reported.
He said if a complaint was made, an investigation would follow, but more than anything, law enforcement agencies are dealing with overseas Internet betting more than illegal bookies.
Shaw also said he knows there are many NCAA Tournament pools that take place every year around campus, but as long as all of the money in the pool is paid out, a law is not being broken.
Since illegal bookies are not investigated around LSU, the two bookies feel rather comfortable about their businesses, not that they were worried in the first place.
“It’s not like I’m running some grand money-making scheme,” the beginner said. “Most of my friends bet with me, so I’m really not worried about getting caught by the police.”
The veteran said he has people watching out for him because he is willing to take their bets.
“When I hang signs up around my [apartment building] with my phone number telling people to bet with me, I know if the cops go there for some reason someone will just tear them down,” the veteran said. “Besides, the cops are not worried about things like students making bets with each other.”
THE PROBLEM
Though the LSUPD is not actively investigating campus gambling, the NCAA has created a job specifically to combat the problem because it does affect college athletes.
Bill Saum, NCAA director of gambling and agent activities, said his position aims at keeping the integrity of college athletics.
“My position is really about three different issues,” Saum said in a phone interview. “Our department is a sub-department of the overall enforcement services program. Our three missions include education, developing relationships and then of course enforcing rules.”
Saum said education about the rules and regulations the athletes and coaches must follow is a must.
“We believe it’s important to make sure that our coaches and athletes know the rules and know the downfalls of becoming involved in sports wagering,” Saum said. “We also develop relationships with different entities that can help us.
“Whether it’s state, local or federal law enforcement, or whether it’s folks on the rehabilitation side or researchers, we get help,” Saum said. “And because we do live in the services enforcement department, we also must investigate, enforce and try to determine how much sports wagering is going on out there.”
According to the National Gambling Impact Study Commission’s final report in 1999, upwards of $380 billion is wagered every year on sports, both college and pro.
“We believe (illegal betting) has been a long-standing problem in both professional and college athletics,” Saum said. “We’re concerned about the integrity of the game, and we’re concerned about the personal safety and welfare of the student athletes.”
Saum said the NCAA has one unified view of betting on college sports, whether it is students or adults doing it.
“We believe that it’s inappropriate,” Saum said. “We believe folks should watch the game for the natural action and reaction of the game, whether it’s the officials, the athletes or the coaches. We don’t think that folks should be more interested in the point spread. I think it’s inappropriate for adults to wager on minors. I think it’s inappropriate to wager on amateur athletics and professionals. I think it’s proven over time that when individuals get involved in sports wagering, it has the potential to impact the integrity of the game.”
Saum said he knows nearly every college campus is infested with illegal sports wagering, and a good number of college athletes are wagering on sports, which could cost them their eligibility and possibly prosecution.
“Several studies indicate that 25 percent of football and basketball Division I students athletes wager,” Saum said. “About 5 percent wager on the game they play in. And a little bit less than 1 percent change the outcome of the game. It’s incredibly easy to find someone to bet with. We believe there are student bookies on every campus in America.”
THE SOLUTION
Saum said neither he nor the NCAA will stop the fight against sports wagering, either legal or illegal, until legal betting is outlawed through legislation. He said he thinks legislation to stop legal sports wagering in Nevada would decrease illegal wagering.
“I think there’s a mixed message,” Saum said. “I think young people are not really certain what’s legal and illegal, and I think any barriers we can put up on sports wagering would be healthy for the games and healthy for the athletes.”
Saum said it is a large task to get legislation to the floor, but once it is there, he believes it will be passed.
“It’s difficult to get it to the floor,” Saum said. “It’s difficult because the casino industry has such an immense budget.”
Saum said the NCAA is presently in the midst of a study surveying 50,000 student athletes. He says he cannot wait to see the results of the study revolving around athletes gambling habits.
“I think the study will show there’s a problem on our college campuses and that we need to spend more time and money fighting it,” Saum said. “We need to engage our college presidents and athletic administrators to fight the problem.”