- Police in Douglas County are seeking a man who allegedly cashed a gaming voucher that wasn’t his
- The incident occurred at Caesars Republic Lake Tahoe
One might think that coming across a gaming voucher on a casino floor is Lady Luck’s way of delivering some good fortune. In reality, it’s a criminal act to pick up the ticket.
Abandoned cash-out vouchers temporarily remain the legal property of the person who cashed out the play.
In Nevada, state law requires that casinos keep unclaimed vouchers for 90 days for the rightful winner to collect the outstanding gaming credit. After three months, the voucher becomes unclaimed property. The state receives 75% of the value, and the casino keeps 25%. More than $20 million a year goes unclaimed in Nevada alone.
This week, police in Douglas County allege that a man sat down at a slot where he realized more than $300 in credits remained on the machine. Law enforcement says a woman, who later notified police about her mistake, got up and walked away without cashing out her credits.
Casino Surveillance Locates Suspect
After the woman notified casino security at Caesars Republic in Stateline, NV, that she had forgotten to cash out her slot credits, an investigation ensued.
The casino’s eye in the sky captured an unidentified man sitting down at the slot in question and quickly cashing out the credits. The casino surveillance followed the man cashing out the Fast Cash ticket at a self-redemption kiosk.
A woman of similar age was photographed following the man. Police believe the two were together.
If you recognize either the unidentified male suspect or the unidentified female subject, please contact Douglas County Sheriff’s Investigator Ryan Grant at 775-781-1227,” the sheriff’s office said.
The former Harveys Lake Tahoe casino resort became Caesars Republic earlier this year through a $160 million renovation. It marked the second Caesars Republic to open, following the non-gaming Caesars Republic Scottsdale in 2024.
Caesars Republic Lake Tahoe features an 88,000-square-foot casino with 750 slots, 31 table games, and a Caesars Sportsbook. The 19-story hotel has 743 guestrooms, with the resort featuring five restaurants, an outdoor amphitheater, a comedy club and cabaret, and a nightclub.
Nevada Voucher Law
Picking up an abandoned casino gaming voucher is a criminal act under the Nevada Revised Statutes.
Specifically, NRS 465.070 stipulates that it is a fraudulent act to “claim, collect or take, or attempt to claim, collect or take, money or anything of value in or from a gambling game, with intent to defraud, without having made a wager contingent thereon, or to claim, collect or take an amount greater than the amount won.”
Violators of NRS 465.070 are subjected to misdemeanor and felony charges, with the offense determined based on the value of the voucher and other parameters, like whether force was used.
Instead of abandoning gaming vouchers worth only pennies, many casinos encourage gamblers to donate the tickets in receptacles located across the gaming floor. Caesars’ Caesars Makes Change program, which benefits the Caesars Foundation, collects gamblers’ ticket-in, ticket-out voucher donations.
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