The troopers' instincts apparently were on the money. "Some of our guys speculated right away," he said, "that if it's this wide open, police have to be involved." When Graffeo and his partners dressed up like out-of-towners and canvassed the shop for the first time, a collective light bulb flashed over their heads. "You could see the whole thing from the street.
"When we heard there was some illegal gambling on Bourbon Street, we thought maybe it was some small dice game or something we were shocked when we saw how much money was involved," said state Trooper Tony Graffeo, a member of the Casino Gaming Special Investigation Unit that broke the case. The scam, also known as Razzle or Cajun Bingo, involves a carnival board game and relies on slick-talking dealers who bamboozle players into placing bets they can never win. The 8th District police station on Royal Street is one block from where tourists were fleeced on a daily basis, with some victims reporting losses as steep as $18,000. This time federal authorities are focused on a question that goes beyond the misdemeanor gambling charges lodged in previous busts: What did New Orleans police officers know, and how high up the chain of command did that knowledge go? The scam, known as Razzle Dazzle, was shut down again last month.
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