For several years, Judge Cheryl Moss presided over the Nevada Gambling Treatment Diversion Court, which was set up in 2013 as an alternative to sending gambling addicts who steal money to prison.
Her first case set the tone for subsequent cases and decisions: A grandmother with no criminal history embezzled more than $500,000 from her employers to keep playing video poker. She spent more than two years in prison before being accepted into the new court system, created for non-violent offenders whose crimes can be traced to drugs, alcohol or gambling.
The judge says such people are fighting a disease, and are not necessarily moral bankrupts. She told ESPN, “Sometimes you have to show a little tough love. I try to get people out of chaos.”
Now retired, Moss sees the burgeoning market for sports betting in the United States as a reason to lead a national campaign to export Nevada’s gambling treatment courts to other jurisdictions.
“The biggest problem is how the public perceives them,” Moss said. “They’ve got a disease, just like alcohol, that is beyond their control.”
Experts in problem gambling are expecting a tidal wave of gambling addiction to follow as states fall over themselves to legalize sports betting; so many of them support Judge Moss’s efforts. The problem gambling rates are steady for most of the U.S., but now there will be a bigger opportunity for such addictions to flourish, says the National Council on Problem Gambling. It urges sportsbook operators to set aside a portion of their profits to help fund treatments and to try to identify addicts before they harm themselves or others.
Carol O’Hare, executive director for the Nevada Council on Problem Gambling says the special court “is not a get-out-of-jail-free” card. “There’s extensive monitoring. Literally, their entire life has to be laid open to the court: where they go, they’re on GPS monitoring for that; they cannot use any substance, must disclose financials completely. The court knows where every dime goes.” Participants are also required to undergo drug testing, counseling and to pay restitution.
According to Moss, “That’s the biggest dilemma in the last 20 years that I’ve been in this field, and it ties in with the stigma of being labeled a moral degenerate gambler,” Moss says. “Gambling disorder is a disease, like alcohol or drugs. Some people can control it, some people can’t.”
She is fighting the prevailing view that gambling addiction is a moral weakness, not a disease. She’s formed a group of experts to push for gambling treatment courts in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts.
Meanwhile, the grandmother who was her first case now works at the Nevada Council of Problem Gambling. She may never be in a position to pay back the $500,000 she stole.
At Judge Moss’s final hearing before she retired, the woman tearfully told her: “I just want to say thank you. You have always treated us as people first, and that was huge. It was a long time coming getting to your courtroom, and I was nervous, but you eased those fears on the first day. And the commitment you’ve held us to, the accountability, what you’ve given us, the road to recovery, I’ll always be grateful. Thank you for being that wonderful judge that didn’t judge us.”
