Casino fined for allowing 2-year-old on board

Friday, Jan. 28, 2000 | 9:40 a.m.

St. Joseph Riverboat Partners, which owns the St. Jo Frontier Casino, said it would appeal the fines announced during Wednesday's commission meeting in the St. Louis suburb of Maryland Heights.

The gaming commission said that on Nov. 4, a woman with a 2-year-old daughter in a stroller was given a boarding pass and entered the boat. Only those 21 or older are allowed in the gambling area of the boat.

A cocktail waitress spotted the mother and the little girl and reported them to security. They were escorted off the boat.

The guard who allowed them into the gambling area was fired on the spot, and the two were only on the boat for three to five minutes.

"For some reason, the security guard on duty let her on," said Larry Seckington, general counsel for St. Joseph Riverboat Partners, owner of the casino. "I don't know what he was thinking about. He had been trained."

In the other case, casino coupons were sent to two people who had been voluntarily or involuntarily "disassociated" from the casino. People can put themselves on the list as part of a program to help problem gamblers stay out of casinos.

The St. Jo Frontier Casino regularly sends mail to the members of its Players Club, and purges the names of people who have disassociated themselves from gambling, Seckington said.

But the two names somehow slipped through, he said.

"We catch a lot of them, but for some reason we didn't catch those," Seckington said.

The casino learned of the mistake and sent follow-up letters voiding the coupon.

The casino has 30 days to appeal the fine.