Gambling is a vice and one High Court case has proved the point beyond argument. A man who blew £2 million at the roulette wheel in two hours was ordered to cover his losses, with interest, after failing to convince a judge that casino staff should have known that he was in the grip of an uncontrollable addiction.
The man said that ‘the devil’ made him gamble and that the casino’s management was aware of his compulsion to bet enormous sums. He claimed that he had been tempted back to the gaming table during a conversation with the casino’s chief executive and offered unlimited credit.
However, in rejecting those allegations and upholding the casino’s case, the Court unhesitatingly preferred the chief executive’s account of the conversation. There was no factual foundation for the man’s plea that the club had violated the terms of its gaming licence and he had failed to establish that he was a gambling addict at the relevant time. In those circumstances, he was the author of his own misfortune.