Two lawsuits filed in Cole County accuse Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway of unlawfully using threats of criminal prosecution to force bars and gas stations to shut down slot machine games.
The latest case, filed Friday by an entity founded last year called the Missouri Licensing Advocacy Group based in Osage Beach, argues Hanaway and the Division of Alcohol and Tobacco Control are threatening the liquor and other licenses of businesses that host the machines.
While state law requires anyone receiving a liquor license to be “of good moral character,” that phrase is undefined in the statute and can’t be invoked just because there is a game on the premises that the state believes is illegal.
According to the lawsuit, the organization has members who include liquor suppliers, convenience stores, bars and other licensees. The case was filed by the organization and not by any individual member.
The problem with the enforcement effort is that it treats all games as though they are illegal, said Samuel Trapp, co-founder of the organization.
“They come in and claim you’re breaking the law, and suddenly you’re tried, found guilty, convicted and there’s no due process,” Trapp said.
In a case filed June 18, a St. Charles County restaurant called Tuners Bar & Grill asked for class action status to sue Hanaway to block her from threatening prosecution if retailers do not turn off games at their locations.
In that lawsuit, attorneys for Turners argue that Hanaway, without winning any criminal convictions, has decided that games that allow players to see the outcome of the next play, called “pre-reveal” games, must be shut down.
The owners cannot wait to be charged and then argue the games were legal, the lawsuit states.
‘For a Missouri retailer, prosecution is not a clean path to legal clarity,” the lawsuit states. “It means public accusation, possible arrest, search warrants, seizure of machines and cash, forfeiture proceedings, loss of banking relationships, landlord pressure, insurance problems, damage to licenses, termination of retail contracts, and reputational injury that no later judgment can fully repair.”
Hanaway’s aggressive stance against the games is a marked change from her predecessors, Andrew Bailey and Eric Schmitt, who both largely ignored the growing presence of the games.
Bailey recused his office from a 2021 lawsuit filed by the biggest game vendor, Torch Electronics, after taking large political donations from political action committees controlled by the company’s lobbyist, Steve Tilley.
In February, a federal judge ruled in a civil lawsuit that “pre-reveal” games offered by Torch “meet the statutory definition of ‘gambling device’ and are therefore illegal.”
Since that decision, Hanaway has threatened Torch, based in Wildwood, with prosecution. The company turned its games off in early April to avoid criminal charges.
The state has been working closely with federal investigators on cases involving slot machines at retail locations. A Georgia resident pleaded guilty to money laundering and illegal gambling in May in federal court in Springfield.
And as the legal pressure has ramped up, so has the political fight over the machines. Missouri lawmakers debated, but did not pass, a bill to allow slot machine games licensed by the Missouri Lottery. Companies on both sides of the debate have poured millions into this year’s legislative elections to influence the outcome in 2027.
But until the Legislature writes a new definition of a gambling device, pre-reveal games should be presumed to be legal, the lawsuit by Turners Bar & Grill states.
Turner’s offers pre-reveal games, the lawsuit states, but they are not Torch machines.
Demands from Hanaway that all pre-reveal games be turned off go beyond her authority, the lawsuit contends.
“It treats resemblance as guilt,” the lawsuit states. “It treats a machine that looks like something the state disfavors as a crime. And it treats a nonbinding federal district-court ruling involving Torch Electronics — different devices, different evidence, different parties, and a private competitor dispute — as if it amended the Missouri Revised Statutes. It did not.”
Both lawsuits are in their early stages and no response has been filed.
James Lawson, deputy chief of staff to Hanaway, said the office would not comment on the specifics of the lawsuits.
“We’re happy to litigate this issue in court,” Lawson said. “We’ve been filing cases on this for months.”
The Turners lawsuit asks the court to declare that the statute being used by Hanaway to prosecute pre-reveal games is unconstitutionally vague and to block her from further charges.
Trapp’s group wants a broader ruling on the way that licensing agencies can be used and to define the standards for deciding whether a violation has occurred that warrants revoking or denying a license.
Hanaway wants to shut the games down because they are illegal and create other problems, Lawson said.
“They create magnets for organized, violent crime, money laundering and illegal activity and put them out in the middle of storefronts,” he said. “It is a billion-dollar, unregulated, cash industry.”
