Seattle Sheriff Raids Slot Machine Operators
A sweeping enforcement action against illegal gambling machines leads to arrests and property seizures across the city.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Nineteen trade slot machines were captured by sheriff's deputies up to an early hour Saturday morning as the result of a raid. Not machines alone, but poker games and other gambling operations were the objects of the raid. Engaged in the hunt were Under-Sheriff S. Corcoran and Deputies Cudhee, Bunce, Nelson, McGee, Lambert, Handier, and Allen. Sixteen machines were picked up in the afternoon by the deputies and now repose in the sheriff's prison. Six arrests were made, and the defendants were taken before Justice Brown, by whom they were released on their own recognizance until Monday afternoon. The men arrested were Joseph Dizard, B. E. Vickery, H. M. Prince, James Brewster, C. O. Rinehard, and J. W. Lowrie. Nearly all the saloon and cigar proprietors around town withheld their machines from exhibition Saturday morning, in obedience to notice given Friday evening by the sheriff's office that all machines in operation Saturday morning after 9 o'clock would be confiscated.
“Several of the slot machine operators were disposed to be defiant. As soon as one machine disappeared in the custody of a deputy sheriff, another would take its place.”
This 1903 crackdown highlights the perennial tension between municipal authorities and the gaming industry in Washington. While the 'slot machine' has evolved into modern digital casinos and sports betting apps, the underlying civic struggle over regulating vice remains a core debate in local politics.
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