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457 So. 2d 205

State v. Young

Louisiana Court of Appeal

Decided September 26, 1984

Louisiana Court of Appeal · decided 1984-09-26

Cited by 2 later decisions — most recently December 1990

2 state decisions

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“a location or place open to the view of the public or the people at large such as a street, highway, neutral ground, sidewalk, park, beach, river bank or other place or location viewable therefrom....”

quoted by 1 later decision, including 495 So. 2d 1306 - State v. Griffin

“game, contest, lottery, or contrivance ...”

quoted by 1 later decision, including 495 So. 2d 1306 - State v. Griffin

Relies on 440 So. 2d 115 - State v. Walters · 365 So. 2d 464 - State v. Muller

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1984-09-26

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

FRED W. JONES, Jr., Judge.

¶1Young, Davis and Hamilton were charged separately but tried jointly in the Shreveport City Court for gambling in public in violation of La.R.S. 14:90.2. They were found guilty and each was sentenced to pay a fine of $50.00. Each defendant applied to this court for a writ of review, which we granted and consolidated for purposes of review.

¶2According to the evidence presented at the trial, these defendants were apprehended by an officer who observed them “shooting dice” in a Shreveport laundromat. They could be seen through a window from the street. Their contention, made in the trial court and here, is that the gambling statute does not cover or apply to such a location. The codal article in question provides in part:

¶3R.S. 14:90.2

A. Gambling in public is the aiding or abetting or participation in any game, contest, lottery, or contrivance, in any location or place open to the view of the public or the people at large, such as streets, highways, vacant lots, neutral grounds, alleyway, sidewalk, park, beach, parking lot, or condemned structures whereby a person risks the loss of anything of value in order to realize a profit.

¶4A similar clause in our obscenity statute was considered by the supreme court in State v. Muller, 365 So.2d 464 (La.1978). Certain conduct was prohibited “in any location or place open to the view of the public or the people at large such as a street, highway, neutral ground, sidewalk, beach, river bank or other place or location viewable therefrom....” On rehearing the court “determined that the legislature had intended to include only places like parks, sidewalks, parking lots, roads and the like, and not to include buildings and other commercial establishments open to *206the public, such as supermarkets and department stores.” See State v. Walters, 440 So.2d 115, 120 (La.1983).

¶5The following year the gambling statute was added to our Criminal Code, using the same narrow language as Mullerin defining the prohibited location, despite the fact that in the same year the legislature chose to broaden the language of the obscenity act in this respect.

¶6We note further that the gambling article does not contain the clause “or other place or location viewable therefrom” which was contained in the obscenity statute. Therefore, there is no merit to the argument that the defendants were guilty of committing the crime of gambling in public since, although inside a building, they were viewable from a street.

¶7We conclude, therefore, that gambling in the laundromat was not “gambling in public” as defined by La.R.S. 14:90.2. Consequently, these convictions are reversed, the sentences are vacated, and the defendants are ordered discharged.

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