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Tropicana database theft case dismissed
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ATLANTIC CITY - It supposedly was a $108 million theft of one of the most valuable trade secrets in the gaming industry: a confidential list of more than 20,000 top gamblers at Tropicana Casino and Resort.
New Jersey Attorney General Anne Milgram called it nothing short of "corporate espionage" when she announced the charges last year against three casino employees involved in the alleged plot.
But the case ended quietly last month. The defendants were placed in a pre-trial intervention program that ended in an unusually quick two weeks and wiped their records clean, officials said Thursday.
"I thought it was an improvident indictment, meaning one that should have not been brought in the first place," said Edwin J. Jacobs Jr., an Atlantic City defense attorney.
Jacobs represented John Conklin, a former casino marketing executive who was the alleged ringleader in what authorities claimed was the theft of a protected computer database containing a list of 20,300 Tropicana customers.
Tropicana estimated the value of the list at about $108 million because it included the names, addresses, telephone numbers and important gambling data on the high rollers.
Jacobs, however, submitted a report by three independent casino experts that concluded the list was simply a compilation of the customers' gambling losses and little more. In Conklin's defense, Jacobs argued that the list had no value at all and no theft occurred because the information was never stolen from Tropicana in the first place.
According to Jacobs, the weakness of the state's case was manifested by the quick dismissal of the charges. The defendants avoided criminal prosecution by agreeing to enter a pre-trial intervention program, which they completed in two weeks.
Jacobs said that in his 40 years of practicing law, he knew of no one else sailing through pre-trial intervention so quickly. He noted that it normally takes between one and three years to complete.
David Wald, a spokesman for the state Attorney General's Office, declined to comment on the case other than to confirm that the charges were dismissed after the defendants went though pre-trial intervention.
Conklin, of Galloway Township, declined to comment. He had been working as a marketing vice president at Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa, but lost his job after his indictment last year. Also charged in the case were James DiMarco, of Ocean City, and Justin Litterelle, of Las Vegas. The three men had worked at Tropicana before taking jobs at other casinos.
Authorities alleged that while the men were still at Tropicana in 2005, Conklin had Litterelle download the list of top gamblers from a computer database for "future leverage" to help them bring in new customers when they landed jobs at other casinos. Conklin also allegedly had Litterelle send the list two years later to DiMarco, who by then had lost his job at Tropicana.
Customer database lists are a closely guarded secret of the gaming industry. They contain confidential personal information about customers, including how often they gamble, the amounts they wager and their preferences for casino amenities. Casinos jealously protect the information to prevent it from falling into the hands of competitors.
But in the Tropicana case, the casino maintained possession of the list at all times and there was no evidence that the defendants ever "used" the information for any reason, Jacobs asserted.
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Posted in Atlantic_city, Top_three on Thursday, June 25, 2009 8:10 pm Updated: 11:23 pm.
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