{"id":400747,"date":"2026-09-15T19:56:11","date_gmt":"2026-09-15T19:56:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/400747\/"},"modified":"2026-09-15T19:56:11","modified_gmt":"2026-09-15T19:56:11","slug":"gaming-officials-hit-the-jackpot-in-st-petersburg-seize-hundreds-of-illegal-slots-in-operation-final-spin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/400747\/","title":{"rendered":"Gaming officials hit the jackpot in St. Petersburg, seize hundreds of illegal slots in ‘Operation Final Spin’"},"content":{"rendered":"

‘These machines are designed to take advantage of people, and far too often that means senior citizens living on fixed incomes.’<\/p>\n

The Florida Gaming Control Commission (FGCC<\/a>) joined law enforcement agencies on a crackdown of two gambling operations in St. Petersburg that ended with the seizure of hundreds of illegal slot machines and other evidence.<\/p>\n

\u201cOperation Final Spin\u201d focused on the Action Arcade on 54th Avenue North and The Zoo Sports Club and Grille on 66th Street North in St. Petersburg. The FGCC along with investigators from the Pinellas County Sheriff\u2019s Office, the Florida Highway Patrol and the Department of Business and Professional Regulation acted on search warrants at both locales and found a trove of alleged illegal gambling equipment.<\/p>\n

At Action Arcade, 90 illegal slot machines and about $142,000 in cash were found. Two people were charged with possession of slot machines and keeping a gambling house.<\/p>\n

At the Zoo, another 73 illegal slot machines and some $105,000 in cash were seized. One person at that business was charged with possession of slot machines and being an agent of a gambling house.<\/p>\n

FGCC Chair Tina Repp and Seminole Republican Rep. Berny Jacques<\/a> were physically present during the enforcement action as the raids were conducted.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThese machines are designed to take advantage of people, and far too often that means senior citizens living on fixed incomes who can least afford to lose what they have,\u201d Jacques said.<\/p>\n

\u201cRemoving 163 machines and nearly $250,000 in cash from these operators is about protecting the most vulnerable members of our community. Thank you to the work of the Florida Gaming Control Commission and partner law enforcement agencies.\u201d<\/p>\n

Operation Final Spin comes as the FGCC has substantially increased illegal gaming investigations in recent years<\/a>. The agency was created only four years ago and there have already been more than 175 arrests as a result of probes into illegal gaming across the state.<\/p>\n

In 2025 alone, the FGCC confiscated $14.47 million in illegal gambling funds and another 6,725 illegal slot machines from illegal gambling operations, according to a news release<\/a>\u00a0issued by the agency. Those figures are significantly higher than in 2024.<\/p>\n

\u201cOperation Final Spin and the more than 200 illegal arcades we have shut down before this, should make it clear that our goal is to disrupt and dismantle illegal gaming across the state of Florida,\u201d Repp said.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"‘These machines are designed to take advantage of people, and far too often that means senior citizens living…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":400748,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[12658,159393,6048,6046,618,159377,159394,4448,4312,202,204,203,199,201,200,159395,87455],"class_list":["post-400747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-department-of-business-and-professional-regulation","tag-erney-jacques","tag-fgcc","tag-florida-gaming-control-commission","tag-florida-highway-patrol","tag-gambling-house","tag-operation-final-spin","tag-pinellas-county-sheriffs-office","tag-slot-machines","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-the-zoo-sports-club-and-grille","tag-tina-repp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=400747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/400748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=400747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=400747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=400747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}