SLIDELL, LA -- Maloney Gaming Management here has filed a suit against St. Tammany Parish that charges city officials sold them a bingo parlor operating license -- then amended regulations to ban such venues after it had leased and remodeled two locations, and purchased electronic bingo machines to outfit them.
Maloney Gaming said that in February and March 2009, it paid for and received commercial and occupational licenses, as well as certificates of completion, entitling the company to operate a store called Crystal Palace Bingo in Lacombe and another hall under the same name in Covington.
Three months later, the St. Tammany Parish Council banned "the specific game of chance identified as electronic video bingo."
Not unlike operators in other states who have had equipment seized after slot-type machines were first legalized then subsequently banned, Maloney Gaming said the parish violated its rights under Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution by depriving the firm of its valuable property without due process.
Maloney Gaming is seeking $1 million or more as restitution for lost revenues and expenditures on equipment, licenses, remodeling and attorneys' fees.
