On casino patrol with the MHP

By Greg Reeves
People get loose at casinos - looser than the slots. Women neglect their purses. Happy (winning) gamblers meander around with cups of cash and tokens. Pockets can be ripe for picking.
We didn't actually see any of that in our tour of a local casino today with members of the Missouri Highway Patrol's gaming division. But troopers say the games are magnets for pickpockets and all manner of scammers.
There are casino security personnel to keep watch, of course, and a different job falls to the 104 gaming division troopers - doing constant software upgrades and game-integrity checks on complex slot machines and other EGD's - electronic gaming devices.
And it takes a lot of time. A single upgrade project last year, for example, helped push trooper overtime hours to 17,000 - something gaming commission enforcement chief Steve Johnson said in the commission's annual report he wants to cut down next year.
That overtime bill falls to the casinos, and Johnson tells Crime Scene KC those businesses will be better served with the addition of eight EGD computer specialists - freeing troopers for other tasks at the casinos.
"We’re bringing on guys who have a much higher degree of expertise," Johnson said. "We think it'll be far more efficient."