► In 1994, the state Supreme Court held that bingo is a form of lottery and thus illegal except where expressly authorized by a constitutional amendment. See City of Piedmont v. Evans, 642 So. 2d 435, 436–37 (Ala. 1994).
► According to a 1997 unanimous opinion of the Court of Criminal Appeals, authored by now Chief Justice Sue Bell Cobb, the term “bingo” as used in local constitutional amendments means nothing other than “the ordinary game of bingo.”
Acknowledging “this state’s strong public policy against lotteries as expressed in § 65 of the Alabama Constitution,” the court unanimously declared that “bingo” is a “narrow exception to the prohibition of lotteries in the Alabama Constitution.”
The court held that “no expression in [an] ordinance [governing the operation of bingo] can be construed to include anything other than the ordinary game of bingo,” lest the ordinance be “inconsistent with the Constitution of Alabama.” See Foster v. State, 705 So. 2d 534, 537–538 (Ala. Crim. App. 1997).
► In 2006, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled in Barber v. Jefferson County Racing Association that a slot machine is illegal, no matter what it’s called.
Machines that “look like, sound like, and attract the same class of customers as conventional slot machines, and, when integrated with the servers, serve essentially the same function as … slot machines” are illegal.
(Information provided by Gov. Bob Riley through Executive Order #44)
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