Carnival midways are the only venues in the United States where local police departments allow carnival lots to be free crime zones for illegal gambling, larceny, and fraud. ", In this CBS News Online, July 12, 2011, video. The mark must accumulate 100 yards (or over) to win that X-Box or HD TV. Our excitement over cotton candy and carnival rides easily matches that of our kids. Carnival midways are the only venues in the United States where local The fair is an extension of her; it is her identity and passion. Its a fundamental divide in human society, and the sedentary city-folks have mostly won. A week after Dearborns Arab festival, Sandra Thomas took her Today show hidden camera investigation crew to NAMEs midways in Biloxi, Mississippi, and Indianapolis, Indiana, to see if the NAME carnivals at those locations displayed crooked games. have largely been replaced by a bunch of rides and cheesy (somewhat rigged) games of skill crammed into a municipal or shopping center parking lot. Theres something inherently interresting in flirting with the danger of putting your entertainment in the hands of a untrustworthy-looking stranger, and I know more than one of our crew made extra money just off of their image / appearance in that way. Repeat for nine months. Get one nights sleep and start setting up in the morning. East coast or west? Carnys got nothin! Not to say that all carnies are no-goodniks, but I think theres enough evidence and history to see where the reputation comes from. The objective of the Razzle agent is to. Starting Jan. 1, 2019, Illinois law will require carnival companies to conduct criminal background checks of all employees. Assisting the NBCs Today show (and reimbursed for expenses) as their police carnival games expert, I was assigned by Thomas to investigate Michigan carnivals and especially the games at the 2012 Arab Festival, which draws about 300,000 patrons. LITTLE ROCK, Ark. To address the puzzling doggedness of plain-sight crooked carnival games, one has to first take a look at the history, criminalities, winks and nods of police, and the behind-the-scenes components enabling and perpetuating this century-old system of corruption. Carnivals/fairs are a lot of hard work. Michael L. Cella was convicted of aggravated criminal sexual abuse and sentenced to 3 years in prison for fondling the children while strapping them in for rides. By the time all is said and done, it's usually about a 20- to 24-hour shift of hard physical labor, depending on how smoothly things go. At the time, Nix was already serving a life sentence for a 1972 murder (unrelated to the death of Buford Pussers wife). The party moves from town to town weekly, of course. No rigged games, daily ride inspections, and regular and random drug testing andbackground checksgo a long way towardcleaning up the carnie image. It is quite common for illegal carnival operators to pay off police and public officials in order to operate, says Riedthaler in the Corruption of Officials section of his police training seminar called Carnival Games Gambling and Frauds.. Burbank's policy--like other municipalities'--has no teeth because it cannot stop someone with a criminal history from working at a carnival, said lawmakers and law enforcement officials advocating stronger legislation. Party one night. Im curious because Ive worked shows for many years, both as a canvas boss and business manager. Sponsors, and especially church festival committees, likely make the mistake of trusting carny-managers under the ill-judged impression that they (sponsors) share game profits. Frank had been granted state fair contracts in Michigan and Florida over the previous 25 years. Carnivals are ubiquitous in the Garden State, but an aura of mystery swirls around the people who stage the phantasmagoric spectacles that light up empty fields I dont know if it compares, but I do know that some people there worked the shady angle purposefully. A favorite American mythologyis that of the carnie, someone who works at a carnival. State legislators said carnival companies have exaggerated costs to kill bills. A local sponsors cut is often around one-quarter of the carnivals total gross receipts. 47% of Carnival Workers have a high school diploma degree, 10% major in criminal justice. Richardson, aware of the so-called games for two years, not only failed to command appropriate investigative action, he also failed to properly document the complaints in the county police files This way, a nosy reporter, going through police files, will not encounter any crime complaints to write about. WebWhile the vast majority of carnival workers are responsible and helpful, a few have been caught engaging in criminal activity. So usually, we don't tell townies that we are carnies because they immediately judge us for it. Dang, and I bet the smile you give wouldve made me buy more of whatever you were selling. Carnival midways are the only venues in the United States where local police departments allow carnival lots to be free crime zones for illegal gambling, larceny, and fraud. It goes back to the Nomads versus the Egypt, Rome versus the Barbarians. [3] As words are assimilated into the culture at large, they lose their function and are replaced by more obscure or insular terms. You have to be clean-shaven, no tattoos (if you do, you have tocover them), and wear clean uniforms. Hey! Carnival game players lose 95 percent of the time says a carnival game enforcement specialist, Corporal Glenn Hester of the Glynn County Police Department of Brunswick, Georgia. For a carnival owner or manager to deny responsibility is like saying I didnt run you over, my car did! When it comes to interviews, carnival owners and managers will act outraged while feigning ignorance about the rigged game and its perpetrator. In running background checks at five events, the Illinois attorney general's office and Cook County sheriff's department found that among 179 carnival employees, The cost of play builds exponentially. Most carnival game agents, these days, would rather design and display attractive child-luring games that would serve to mark thousands of young teens for their allowance or grass-cutting money. No roots, no stability. Thomass U.S. Army Special Forces sniper, who could take out the enemy at 200 yards with one shot, was unable to Shoot out the Star from the distance of 12 feet with 100 shots. It would be a winning proposition to bet that changes in carnival status wont come overnight. From the foul line, the rims appeared to be regulation and served to attract and dupe naive victims out of $2 a shot. Here is the story of Edgar Allen Gregory Jr., who in 1993, was captured on film during a Dateline NBC hidden camera investigation for operating a racket-show while displaying several big-dollar-fraudulent gambling games on his mobile carnival midway at the North Tennessee State Fair. Few cities have ordinances that require background checks. Johnson called previous proposed legislation discriminatory. Nixs former lawyer Pete Halat, who later became mayor of Biloxi, blamed the missing money on his former law firm partner Vincent Sherry, who was then a judge of the Second Mississippi District Circuit Court. Do a little googling on carnies and carnival workers and youll find thats a common assessment. (Regulation rims are 18 inches in diameter). Now, lets go back to the first question: Have you ever played a carnival game and felt cheated? After my shift that day, I saw that city carnival for myself and was just as shocked. The last two victims also withdrew money from the ATM. As a career police officer with the Dearborn Police Department (Michigan) and trained in enforcement of carnival games, I became concerned about this unique brand of plain view criminal activity. But the carnival I work forhas spent a long time building their image up to try to distance themselves from the stigma. Also zeroed in as targets, are members of the U.S. military. The carnival marketing target demographic currently ischildren, thereby creating a predictable and dependable source of income, as opposed to the time-tested art of cleaning out the occasional high-dollar Razzle-type mark by which there is always the chance of generating trouble via player beefs. It is an ever-changing form of communication, in large part designed to be impossible to understand by an outsider. In reach of the big payoff at 95 yards but broke, the mark is encouraged by the slick talking flatty to go to the automatic teller machine (ATM) and return with more money stating: You need just a few more yards to win a thousand dollars for each hundred you invested. Yes, they are scraping by and yes they are poor, but labor ready hires anyone who is there to work at 6am in the morning . So, they either rent or default on thier sub-prime mortgage. I informed her that the gaffed carnival basketball rims are not bent by the carnies, but manufactured for the carnies, and for the designed purpose of creating a false impression of size and shape. They even have their own language., At least thats what people think about carnies. Barton County District Judge Mike Keeley on Friday also sentenced Christine Tenney, 40, of La Marque, Texas, So - I dont know how that applies to all carny workers. At that state fair, the contracted carnival, Powers Great American Midways, could gross from $4 to $6 million, as published in Business North Carolina. Marcello tolerated the Dixie Mafias presence as long as they played by his rules and paid for his hospitality. Because of the mixture of carnival-related contract money and politics, the unwritten rule in Dearborn and other towns figures to be: No enforcement of midway games!, NAME also had a contract to pay off-duty Joliet, Illinois, police officers an hourly rate of $49.92 to work security at a weekend shopping mall carnival. Lots of hard work, but I got to meet some great people - especially the bands we set up for. I estimated that the 12 innocent-looking basketball games alone accounted for $25,000 in 2012, based on the numbers of neighborhood kids trying their luck endlessly for four days. Theft, fraud, and sexual misconduct are all examples of these crimes. They live on the road throughout the summerand fall, setting up and tearing down rides, or hosting games to bilk people out of their money (unless you know the secrets to beating their tricks). Not an easy life. Convicted of bank loan schemes in 1986 and never spending a day in prison, the Gregorys befriended Tony Rodham, brother of President Bill Clintons wife, and now presidential candidate, Hillary Rodham Clinton, and were awarded the contracts to operate his carnival, United Shows of America Inc., for President Clintons White House Press Picnic in 1998 and 2000. When interviewed by reporters, carnival owners and managers never will admit to personal misdeeds and will fabricate a tale about being unaware of any criminal activity on the midway. It was a really good business for a long time, though. In other words, carnies are not any more shady than other types of work crews that perform similar tasks - its just that people are put off by - to paraphrase Philip Marlowe - having to see the works when the lid is lifted off of life. WebCarny allowed the carnival workers to hide the truth of their activities from the populace. As for the coworkers I got along with, I never asked them about their criminal background, so I couldnt tell you. Carol Stream has one of the stronger local ordinances, barring felons convicted in the past five years from working as carnival employees. In 2012, a financial advisor from New York City, who read about Razzle in one of my books, wrote to inform me that he was swindled for a total of $11,000 as a result of playing Razzle at a Manhattan street fair. That would surely subject them to a false arrest claim and a possible headline about their rip-off (the kids) church festival. This impeded rebound, giving the impression of an easy win as the grifters demo balls never bounce out. The total is then added up. On February 6, 2015, Willie Lovett was sentenced to 7.5 years in federal prison for Conspiracy to obstruct enforcement of criminal laws and related gambling crimes. Carnival companies, not the state, should absorb the costs of background checks, lawmakers said. Twenty-four others, mostly women and children, had stayed behind at the campsite. This particular con links fraud and gambling together with a smooth-talking con artist (agent) who bedazzles his mark, and wins every time. "We did find a large number of them had criminal records," said sheriff's office spokesman Bill Cunningham. The Dixie Mafias territory stretched all over the South, from Georgia to Oklahoma. It usually takes zero years I will usually see three to eight tubs on every midway of Wade Shows and North American Midway Entertainment. 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