Georgia Stores Illegally Paying Cash on COAMs
COAMs or Coin Operated Amusement machines are leased/owned and operated by the Georgia Lottery Corporation. Their use is controlled by the Georgia Lottery. Still, convenience store owners are paying out cash on gamblers winning off of these machines also known as video slot machines.
“I would say that Chatham County has a high producing area as far as cash in the machines,” said Condy Ledford, Lead Investigator, GBI Commercial Gambling Unit.
“Approximately 10% of those seeking help with the video lottery terminals or video slots are coming from Chatham County,” said Eric Groh, Executive Director of The Georgia Council on Problem Gambling.
Georgia Lottery and Addressing The Problem.
Numerous arrests have been made over the past 5 years over alleged smash and grab robberies of the convenience store slot machines. One incident, the thief retrieved 7900.00 from a single machine. The question that raises eyebrows is why 7900.00 in cash daily is retrieved from the convenience store COAM video slot machines.
The Georgia Video Slots Accept Credit Cards
Products in convenience store are usually small purchase items. The concern is how thousand of dollars could be spent by gamblers who are operating machines that are legal.
Concerns Over The Large Gambling Revenues Generated
In less than one year in only three gas stations in one rural Georgia County: law enforcement records showed the COAM slot machines took in $3,073,326 in Harrelson County 2016 alone.
