Illegal slot machines destroyed with excavators: Herne as a role model for other cities?

It is estimated that there are up to 50,000 illegal gaming machines in Germany. Not all of them have a criminal background, but they are certainly detrimental to the prevention of addiction and do not help the reputation of the industry. The city of Herne no longer wants to accept this situation on its territory. To underline its decision, the city destroyed a large number of unauthorised devices in a highly publicised campaign. This has caused quite a stir in the political arena.

We recently reported that the amusement arcades industry is set to come out of the "dirty corner" in 2024. The initiators of this project are the German Association of Towns and Municipalities (DStGB) and the German Gaming Machine Industry. In the course of emphasising the need for such steps, the press releases also mentioned the large number of illegal gaming machines operating in Germany. There is talk of up to 50,000 machines. These are not always used for criminal purposes. Often, old machines that no longer meet today's standards have simply been forgotten: That is what the descriptions say.

Be that as it may, there is no doubt in the minds of politicians that such machines undermine the success of addiction prevention. They also reflect badly on amusement arcades as a whole, which already do not have the best reputation in society. Last but not least, operators of legal machines may suffer a competitive disadvantage due to an increased supply of illegal machines. The city of Herne has declared war on these shortcomings. As a sign of this, a number of such machines were destroyed with an excavator in the presence of the press. The action took place some time ago, but was recently described as "exemplary" by the Bochum FDP.

What was the city of Herne talking about?

In the summer of 2023, the city of Herne announced that it would take stronger action against illegal gambling - with "drastic measures" if necessary. This did indeed happen in September. Instead of a major official crackdown on such criminal activities, a symbolic "example" was made of already confiscated and illegally operated gaming machines.

Birgit Stegemann of the city's public order department said at the time: "Since Corona, when regular gambling was closed down, the problem with illegal machines, most of which are located in back rooms, has increased significantly," as reported in the Westfälischer Anzeiger, among others. A development that the city of Bochum has obviously noticed.

The FDP in Bochum could also imagine a similar campaign for their region

In mid-December 2023, some time after the actual dredging operation, the FDP parliamentary group on the Bochum city council took up the issue of illegal gambling in their region. Here too, there has been a significant increase in the number of such machines, and they are very concerned about this.

Chairman Felix Haltt said: "This is an alarming development. We therefore want to know from the administration what the situation is in Bochum. The FDP is calling on the administration to take decisive action against illegal gaming machines: "Bochum should follow the example of the neighbouring city of Herne," said Haltt. "We can also imagine such a campaign for Bochum. It would show clearly that the city has declared war on illegal gambling.

Conclusion

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