Gambling Addict Takes Bookmakers To Court And Loses…
Wednesday, March 12, 2008Posted in: Uncategorized
Well, thank God for that. Common sense prevails at last.
I wanna know who told him it was a good idea to proceed with the court case in the first place. Yeah, probably his lawyer.
“Compulsive gambler Graham Calvert, who had claimed bookmaker William Hill should have stopped him placing bets, lost his case on Wednesday.
The greyhound trainer from Houghton Le Spring, Tyne and Wear, was suing for negligence as well as compensation for personal injuries at the High Court in London.
The 28-year-old, described by his lawyers as a “pathological gambler”, claimed he had lost more than two million pounds, as well as his marriage, livelihood and health as a result of a six-month gambling spree in 2006.
In the landmark case, Calvert’s legal team had argued the bookmaker had been guilty of “negligent encouragement and inducement” by not acting to curb its client’s gambling, even though he had indicated he wanted them to on at least two occasions.”
Bloody dickhead. The thought that this even made it to court annoys the hell out of me. What a waste of freaking time. Remember that blokey who tried to take McDonalds to court because he didn’t know that if you kept on eating burgers, you’d eventually get fat? What a twat.
You think I can sue Gisele Bundchen for being the cause of everything that goes wrong in my life? *g*
Lauren Dane
March 12
5:08 pm
There’s a similar case here where a woman is attempting to sue the owners of a chain of casinos for her “addiction” I hope the court makes her pay legal fees for this collossal waste of judicial time.
Ciar Cullen
March 12
5:41 pm
I’m going to take my mother to court for her lousy Irish DNA. You think it’s not possible? Someone will try it.
There’s the not-quite-flip but related side of regulating every activity so no idiots can get themselves into trouble and no one can get sued. No trans fat. No smoking. I don’t eat trans fat when I can help it, and I don’t smoke (anymore), but I will defend anyone’s right to shove a bucketfull of Crisco down their throat if they like.
Mad
March 12
5:43 pm
I just saw something like this last night on CNN only this time it was a female…and she was a lawyer…dumbass…she loses all her money then sues because they (the casino) didn’t stop her. Please. Grow the f*ck up and stop making excuses.
Eve Vaughn
March 12
6:07 pm
This is what happens when no one learns to take responsibilty for their actions. Sure we can blame the greedy lawyers, but they wouldn’t be presenting the cases if there weren’t plenty of people looking for a quick buck to solve their problems.
kirsten saell
March 12
10:11 pm
What Ciar said. You say the words civil libertarian and everyone thinks you’re a nutbar, but there are worse things than being able to decide what to do with your own body, life, money–and taking responsibility for them.
CJ England
March 12
10:32 pm
Well said Eve.
Everyone should take responsibility for their own actions and stop blaming others. I believe the world would be a much better place!
Geesh!
Marianne McA
March 13
5:08 pm
Well, what’s the point of having a law saying the bookmakers have to offer self-exclusion then?
You have a right to tell your bookmakers you’re an addict, and want not to be allowed to bet on account – but if they then let you bet on account, the courts decide against you, because, hell, you’re an addict – you’d have lost the money anyway…
It’s not that I disagree with the judge – he probably would have gambled some other way. But is it really so great that William Hill can profit from someone else’s mental illness? Seriously, if you knew an alcoholic who was trying to stay sober, would you think it moral to offer to sell them vodka? Don’t we have any responsibilty to be decent people?
(Love reading your blog, sorry to disagree so often.)
Karen Scott
March 13
5:32 pm
Marianne, I love being disagreed with, it keeps things interesting.
If I was a shopkeeper, although I wouldn’t offer to sell him alcohol, if he came into my shop, and wanted to buy the bottle of vodka, I wouldn’t refuse him, simply because A, I’m running a business, and B, it shouldn’t be up to me try to save an alcoholic from himself, unless I had a vested interest in them, i.e. he was family.
I don’t think morality has anything to do with it either. He made a choice when he started drinking (yes, in the beginning, it’s always a choice) and the only way he’ll beat the addiction is by first and foremost helping himself.
The same argument can be used for people trying to give up smoking, would you suggest that it would be unethical of me to sell cigarettes to somebody who was trying to give up?
You can lead a horse to water and all that.
Marianne McA
March 13
10:17 pm
But that’s what annoys me – he was trying to help himself. He knew he had a problem, told the bookmakers so, and asked them to exercise their legal obligation to stop him betting on account.
I know an alcoholic, who’d quit. Not easy, and with the cost of rehab, not cheap. He started drinking again when, after a very hard day, someone offered him a drink. He refused. The person came back, and handed him an open bottle of beer… And that was it.
Now, that second person didn’t know the circumstances. So fine. Stuff happens, try again.
But what you seem to be saying is that even if he did know the circumstances, even if the alcoholic had refused saying ‘I can’t drink, I’m an alcoholic’ that there is nothing wrong at all with the second person’s actions. Unless the addict is related to him, Second Person can press drink on the alcoholic, credit lines on the gambler, cigarettes on the non-smoker. Move on, nothing unethical there.
And more than that – and this is where you marginally piss me off – you’re celebrating his right to do so. Your first post seemed to say – ‘Isn’t it great we live in a country where Very Rich People can offer credit to people they know are addicted to gambling!’
Obviously the courts agree with you, but I’m sort of on the side of the addict. Who’s probably an idiot – but still.
Karen Scott
March 14
12:15 am
Well, no Marianne it didn’t. I was pissed at the possibility that somebody could get away with suing a company, probably for millions, for not saying no to them. The very thought of it, offends me deeply.
What you’re talking about is social responsibility, but how far would you go with that? If I own a fast-food joint, and somebody who happens to be on a diet comes in and asks for a burger, and I give them the burger, that makes me the bad person? I just don’t buy that.
Where does personal resposnibility come into this? This might sound rather callous, but quite frankly, the world is full of people who are addicted to one thing or another, and it’s not my job to save them. Harsh, maybe, but at one time in their life, they made a decision that led them down this path.
We could hypothesize this to the nth degree, but the fact is, if I ran a gambing joint, the only way I’d see the addict is if he himself came into the shop and asked to place a bet. I don’t imagine that many bookmakers go out on the street trying to drag gambling addicts into their shops.
Marianne McA
March 14
8:33 am
I don’t know the details of the case, and clearly the courts decided Graham Calvert was in the wrong. And personally, I don’t see how William Hill could have stopped him making cash bids during that period. My understanding though, he that he closed his account, and asked them to exclude him. This is a service they offer, and moreover, I think, a service they are legally bound to offer. He then opened another account, and bet on that. Now William Hill may not have known it was the same man, in which case, fair enough. But I’m cynical enough to suspect that you don’t accept bets for hundreds of thousands of pounds without checking who is betting.
So back to your analogy of the fast food joint.
The analogy in my head is that your fast food joint has a large sign saying ‘ASK US IF YOU’RE ALLERGIC TO NUTS!’ (WH’s offer of a self exclusion policy) and a customer (GC) comes in and says ‘I’m allergic to nuts, can I eat your vegeburger?'(informs the company of his problem) and you say ‘No, have our cheeseburger’, and then the next day, the same customer comes back in, and you remember him, and you know he is allergic to nuts – yes, in my book it would be wrong to sell him a vegeburger, even if he asks for one. The key thing is that you, the vendor know the situation, and can remember that nuts may kill him. I think you’ve a personal responsibilty too.
(I do disagree with the idea that addicts choose addiction. I’m one of the genetically fortunate whose body metabolises alcohol in a way that doesn’t lead to addiction. I couldn’t know that when I first drank. I’d guess the majority of adults in the country drink at least occasionally – they’ve all made the same choice the alcoholic did. In my head it’s like saying of any other ill person: ‘Well, it’s sad they have measles but at one point they made the decision that led them down that path.’ Illness happens to you, you don’t choose it.)