During a gambling bust Wednesday, the Austin Police Department arrested five people for charges other than gambling.
The department arrested Karim Faiq, 22, for theft and three counts of illegal possession of Lone Star cards, a redemption of food stamp benefits. Faiq was assigned an overall bond of $47,000 for all charges. APD also arrested Ismael Karim, 26, Yolanda Williams, 42, Jessica Cassiano, 25, and Mike Cassiano, 29, for theft. Karim, Williams, and Jessica Cassiano were all put on $2,000 bond. Mike Cassiano was assigned a $3,000 bond.
APD conducted an 18-month investigation before raiding 40 convenience stores and game rooms across the Austin area Wednesday. The investigation began when the department received phone calls from citizens complaining about relatives spending savings and whole paychecks gambling on machines they weren't winning on.
The department said it brought in the FBI and the IRS to investigate possible money laundering or tax fraud involvement in the scam. During the raids, the police and federal investigators confiscated more than 700 gaming machines, called eight-liners, that had been tampered with. The machines were set up so that players could not win a jackpot, and typically won nothing even after playing for hours.
Police said they believe that one company is responsible for the scheme and that they would fake a jackpot win every now and then in order to keep people playing.
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