Pickle v. IGT

830 So. 2d 1214, 2002 WL 31619064
CourtMississippi Supreme Court
DecidedNovember 21, 2002
Docket2001-SA-00951-SCT
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 830 So. 2d 1214 (Pickle v. IGT) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Mississippi Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Pickle v. IGT, 830 So. 2d 1214, 2002 WL 31619064 (Mich. 2002).

Opinion

830 So.2d 1214 (2002)

Brenda W. PICKLE
v.
IGT and Sam's Town Hotel and Gambling Hall.

No. 2001-SA-00951-SCT.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

November 21, 2002.

*1215 T. Roe Frazer, II, Jackson, John Gordon Sims, II, attorneys for appellant.

Scott E. Andress, Gulfport, attorney for appellee.

Before PITTMAN, C.J., WALLER and GRAVES, JJ.

WALLER, J., for the Court.

¶ 1. Brenda W. Pickle appeals the judgment of the Tunica County Circuit Court affirming a decision of the Mississippi Gaming Commission denying her claim that she won a $4,724,894.39 wide area primary progressive jackpot at Sam's Town Hotel and Gambling Hall. We likewise affirm.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

The Events of October 26, 1997

¶ 2. Brenda W. Pickle was playing a Wheel of Fortune Wide Area Progressive Jackpot game owned and operated by IGT[1] at Sam's Town Hotel and Gambling Hall in Robinsonville when, at approximately 12:46 a.m. on October 26, 1997, the machine which she was playing landed on Triple Bar-Blank-Blank, an apparent nonwinning combination.[2] However, the bells and whistles and all other indicators of a jackpot were activated, the overhead progressive meter reset to its $1,000,000 base, and IGT's computer system recognized a progressive jackpot hit. IGT also posted a *1216 progressive jackpot win on its internet site.[3]

¶ 3. Since this jackpot was in excess of $50,000, the Mississippi Gaming Commission was required to verify it. Miss. Gaming Comm'n Operations Manual § 5.1. Agent James Abney received a call at approximately 1:33 a.m. of a possible malfunction and arrived shortly thereafter. Abney inspected the machine and found that notwithstanding a non-winning reel alignment of Triple Bar-Blank-Blank on the payline, the machine was locked at $4,724,891.41 and the bells and whistles activated. Abney next viewed the surveillance tapes and posted a security guard at the machine. Abney phoned Special Enforcement Agent Jack Ruby at approximately 2:00 a.m. telling him that a patron had hit the jackpot but there was a problem because the reels did not line up. Ruby instructed Abney to have the IGT representative perform a five game recall test.[4] IGT service representative Tyrus Robinson was summoned, and, at approximately 3:05 a.m.,[5] he made a Polaroid picture of the reel display then entered the machine with the assistance of Sam's Town slot technician Bill Proctor to attempt a five game recall. Abney was standing right behind Robinson and Proctor while they conducted the tests. Robinson was unable to perform the five game recall because the machine had locked up. Later, at approximately 3:22 a.m.,[6] the machine was entered again to perform a reel strip test which meant the reel strips had to be partially removed from the reels themselves to get the real strip number off the back. This was noted on the machine's MEAL (Machine Entry and Access Log) card. This is why the machine displayed Blue 7-Blue 7-White 7 upon the arrival of D.C. Ladner, Director of the MGC Gaming Laboratory. Both entries were captured on surveillance. The reel strips on Pickle's machine were the correct strips for that type of machine.

¶ 4. Ruby arrived at Sam's Town at approximately 6:45 a.m. and was told of the possible malfunction. Ruby was also told that no one had been into the computer board. He later phoned Ladner with this information who thereafter drove to Robinsonville from Biloxi with Gaming Laboratory Engineer Alan Sang. Ladner and Sang arrived at Sam's Town at approximately 5:45 p.m. The results of the Gaming Laboratory investigation are discussed below.

"Wheel of Fortune" Wide Area Progressive Jackpot

¶ 5. A wide area progressive game is one in which play on slot machines throughout the state contribute to a jackpot that continually increments by a percentage of coins played into those machines.[7] Ali Saffari, *1217 IGT's Director of Firmware Engineering, explained the operation of the Wheel of Fortune Wide Area Progressive Jackpot. IGT, and not Sam's Town, actually owns and operates this game. At Sam's Town, the Wheel of Fortune games were clustered in a bank of six machines. Other casinos throughout the state have similar arrangements. Each bank also has an overhead meter displaying the current progressive jackpot value. The information regarding the activity of each Wheel of Fortune machine at a particular casino is sent to a Casino Computer (CCOM) located with those machines at the casino. The CCOM transmits accounting data and coins played data via a telephone line to IGT's central office in Gulfport. The central office is manned twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, and houses IGT's Accounting Data System Communicator (ADSC) and Accounting Data System (ADS). The ADSC and ADS take the information received from the CCOMs at every casino participating in the Wheel of Fortune game and then constantly relay the current progressive values back to the CCOMs at the casinos. Those values are then displayed on the overhead meter and at each machine.[8]

The IGT S-Plus Slot Machine

¶ 6. Although the logic of the IGT S-Plus slot machine is quite complex, a simplification of its processes is necessary to understand what happened. Probably unbeknownst to most casino patrons, the operation of a modern slot machine is based on a computer program. While the machine is idle, its Random Number Generator (RNG) located on its SP chip is constantly generating numbers between one and four billion according to an algorithm. When a patron initiates a play with, for instance, a three-coin maximum bet as Pickle did, the SP chip will "grab" a random number and randomize it to a virtual reel position by applying another algorithm to reduce the random number to a number between one and 512. That number is then randomized to a number between one and 22 to arrive at a physical reel stop. The reel is then stopped. The process is repeated for reel two then reel three. It is at this point that the final results of the game are determined or, stated another way, the "essence of the game" is completed. These results are checksummed, i.e., verified, by repeating the mathematical process described above and then stored on the CMOS memory chip. The CMOS also stores the results of the previous five games.

¶ 7. Another chip, the SS chip or pay table chip, contains pay table information, reel strip information, symbol information, and winning amount information. The computer then evaluates the results; it compares on what the machine landed to the information on the SS chip. The SP chip will then instruct the machine accordingly based on the results as compared to the pay table, be it a payout or a jackpot.[9] In the event of a primary jackpot, the secondary notification process begins and the SP chip instructs the machine to lock *1218 up, reports the jackpot to the casino and IGT systems, and activates the bells, whistles, and lights. Every Wheel of Fortune slot machine throughout the state will then reset to the $1 million base. Also, the machine will have signage stating that a "malfunction voids all pays and plays."

Findings of MGC Gaming Laboratory

¶ 8. While at Sam's Town, Ladner checked to see if a specific wager had been made, checked to assure the machine had not been forcibly opened, and checked for signs of tampering of the security seals.[10] Ladner found everything to be normal.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
830 So. 2d 1214, 2002 WL 31619064, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/pickle-v-igt-miss-2002.