Gaming

Harrah's working on plan to take over Planet Hollywood

Planet Hollywood's Westgate Tower.

Harrah's Entertainment Inc.'s chief executive officer confirmed to employees Wednesday that the company is interested in acquiring the Planet Hollywood resort on the Las Vegas Strip. In an internal e-mail, CEO Gary Loveman told employees of the company's interest, Harrah's spokeswoman Jacqueline Peterson said.

Boyd Gaming sues man over Internet domain name

Boyd Gaming Corp. of Las Vegas on Monday sued the owner of an Internet domain name, charging it wrongly associates one of its casinos with an online gambling site.

Bellagio sues company over alleged trademark infringement

Attorneys for the Bellagio hotel-casino on the Las Vegas Strip are demanding that a Canadian company stop doing business as "Bellagio Limousines.'' The Las Vegas resort filed suit Monday against Bellagio Limousines of the Toronto area in U.S. District Court in Las Vegas, alleging the company has been infringing on the resort's trademarks by offering "Bellagio'' limousine services and by promoting its services with an Internet Web site.

Could the game be partly to blame for addiction?

Si Redd, the late creator of the modern video poker machine, said he never imagined how popular the game would become. Many experts say the relatively simple machines may be more addictive, or appealing to addicts, than video slots with a lot of entertainment features.

Hoping to solve the decades-old mystery of why some people develop gambling problems, a growing number of researchers are studying the other side of the equation: the games that gamblers fixate on.

Wynns agree on ‘amicable’ split of assets in divorce

Steve Wynn and Elaine Wynn have struck a court-approved financial agreement that splits up their estimated $2 billion gambling empire and paves the way for the divorce he has been seeking for eight months.

Golden Nugget opens $150 million, 500-room tower

A standard room in the Golden Nugget's new Rush Tower. The hotel-casino opened the $150 million, 500-room hotel tower on Friday.

The Golden Nugget celebrated a milestone Monday for downtown Las Vegas. The hotel-casino had a grand opening celebration for its Rush Tower, the first new hotel tower to be added to the downtown area since Golden Nugget’s Carson Tower opened in 1989.

Carl Icahn offers $156 million for Fontainebleau, outbids Penn National


Though close to finished, the Fontainebleau may cost another $1.5 billion to complete, on top of $1 billion already owed to lenders.

Investor Carl Icahn will be the stalking horse bidder for the mothballed Fontainebleau Las Vegas casino resort, offering $156 million in cash and financing Monday and outbidding Penn National Gaming. During a hearing in Miami's bankruptcy court, Penn National Gaming initially competed with Icahn but then dropped out of the bidding after going as high as $145 million.

Vegas-based Majestic Star Casino seeks bankruptcy

Las Vegas-based Majestic Star Casino LLC filed for bankruptcy protection today in Delaware after defaulting on debt obligations covering its properties in Colorado, Indiana and Mississippi.

Illness theory gaining ground for gambling addiction

Illness theory gaining ground for gambling addiction

Experts who study gambling addiction remain a long way from knowing why people develop gambling problems. But researchers now know what happens inside the brains of gambling addicts that fuels the addiction, and how best to help them.

Culinary Union sides with Station Casino’s creditors

The Culinary Union heightened the drama in its fight with Station Casinos last week, blaming a management-led buyout for the company’s bankruptcy filing and aligning itself with the company’s creditors.

At CityCenter, it's not your usual uniforms for workers


Designer Jhane Barnes looks at a CityCenter uniform. Barnes' menswear has been sold in Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus.

At CityCenter’s 25,000-square-foot uniform distribution center on Dean Martin Drive, Jhane Barnes, a slight woman with squarish glasses and short hair, proudly shows off clothing racks heavy with new uniforms.

CityCenter hotel welcomes new employees with gala

Food workers prepare to serve 400 newly hired employees during the "Day of Delight" event hosted Saturday at the Mandarin Oriental.

One of CityCenter’s properties held a special event Saturday to welcome its 400 new employees. Mandarin Oriental’s Day of Delight included performances by local entertainers and a parade to show fans from all of the properties in the worldwide hotel group.

In workplaces, even here, help can be hard to come by

If a co-worker has a few too many drinks during an after-work get-together, it’s common for a colleague to take his car keys away. Maybe the colleague or a supervisor will keep an eye on him for other telltale signs of alcohol abuse. But that isn’t the way it usually works with a gambling addict, panelists said at the National Center for Responsible Gaming’s conference on gambling and addiction last week at Mandalay Bay.

The pull of a drug, a push to the brink

Tony McDew, at a bus stop on Spring Mountain Road across from the Fashion Show Mall, holds video camera that he has used to document his struggle with gambling addiction. While he was gambling, money problems forced him to ride the bus regularly.

According to a 2002 report commissioned by the Legislature, there are some 90,000 Nevadans with gambling problems. And Tony McDew is one of them. A few lucky days at the casino got him to believe that gambling was a way to supplement his income.

Judge in Station Casinos case refuses creditors' request

RENO – A federal bankruptcy judge has refused, for the time being, a request by the unsecured creditors of Station Casinos to hire another firm to aid in seeing whether there was any fraud or unsavory dealings in the handling of its finances.