Va. Supreme Court reinstates ban on 'skill' slot machines
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RICHMOND – The Virginia Supreme Court has reinstated for the time being a ban on so-called “skill games” in Virginia until a trial on their existence is held in December.
The order issued Friday reverses an injunction that a lower court had placed against the ban after a Virginia business owner claimed such a block violated his free-speech rights. It claims the ban, which went into effect in 2021, is essentially a work in progress thanks to efforts by the General Assembly to redefine its scope since it became law.
The order said those amendments had essentially turned the original ban into a new one at the plaintiff’s request. Therefore, the lower court mistakenly granted a request to extend the injunction until the civil trial in two months.
It also said the issue was not one of free speech because the ban on them was on conduct rather than content and that the plaintiff had not proven that otherwise.
“Because nothing in the record before us at this stage in the proceeding suggests that the General Assembly seeks to regulate the content of the expression contained within respondents’ video games, but rather, only seeks to prevent the promise (and the ultimate execution) of a payout if a game ends in a particular fashion, respondents are unlikely to succeed on the merits of their free speech claim,” read the order written by justices Stephen McCullough, Teresa Chafin and Wesley Russell. “The circuit court abused its discretion when it concluded otherwise.”
Skill games, which have appeared in convenience stores and other places usually under the Queen of Virginia Games brand, resemble slot machines. However, unlike slot machines, the payouts are not based solely on chance but by the player’s skill with a one-time attempt to manipulate the results to their benefit. The General Assembly originally approved regulation of those games in 2021, but since then it had made amendments to that regulation specifically on the type of cash payouts and banning placement of the machines in “family friendly” business areas such as convenience stores.
Former NASCAR driver Hermie Sadler, who owns a truck-plaza in the Emporia area, successfully persuaded a Greensville Circuit Court judge to issue an injunction against the ban until it could be heard in a civil trial. Over the past two years, the issue has remained tied up in courts, but each time, Sadler’s attorneys were able to keep the injunction in place.
Until now.
In Friday’s order, the justices acknowledged that some of the games are based on storytelling about pirate ships, ghost hunting and dragon slaying. Sadler’s attorneys claimed in part that content drove the ban from family-friendly areas.
The order said the ban addresses the conduct of gambling and has nothing to do with what the games are about.
“Although at times it is difficult to determine where a particular activity falls on the speech/conduct continuum, no such difficulty is present when the activity being regulated is gambling,” the justices wrote. “We long have viewed gambling as conduct that may be heavily regulated and even banned by the commonwealth as an exercise of its police powers.”
News of the order was first reported by The Virginia Mercury, a nonprofit media outlet based in Richmond.
Bill Atkinson (he/him/his) is an award-winning journalist who covers breaking news, government and politics. Reach him at batkinson@progress-index.com or on X (formerly known as Twitter) at @BAtkinson_PI.
