Tim Alper is a journalist who covers betting news and regulation for CasinoBeats. He joined the CasinoBeats team in May 2025. He reports on breaking news and developments in the world of betting, casinos, and...
Read Full BioRussian bailiffs will hand over 20 slot machines confiscated by police in a raid on an illegal casino based in Siberia to the government.
The regional Federal Bailiff Service in Novosibirsk, Siberia’s biggest city, said a court had granted it permission to turn the machines over to the state, the Russian media outlet NDN Info reported.
Police in Novosibirsk seized the machines, all imported from overseas, as evidence in a criminal case launched back in 2024.
At the time, law enforcement officers shut down an illegal gambling den in the city’s busy Dzerzhinsky District.
Police then stored them at a police station near the crime scene until a trial late last year. A district court found the den’s administrator guilty of organizing and conducting gambling activities. The court sentenced her to six months in prison, but suspended the sentence.
Russian Bailiffs Seize Slots
The court has since ruled that the machines have become state property, ordering bailiffs to remove them from the police station.
The development comes as Russian law enforcement agencies step up a crackdown on illegal gambling dens and underground casinos nationwide.
In Tver, a city to the northwest of Moscow, police raided an underground casino hidden in a basement unit beneath a newspaper kiosk, the Russian media outlet Karavan Yamarka reported.
Ministry of Internal Affairs officials and a National Guard special forces unit raided the den, where they reportedly uncovered an illegal casino with daily revenues of 50,000 rubles ($650).
Casino Crackdown
Officers said the Tver casino was only accessible to holders of a “secret phone number.” Police say they found nine people, including staff and patrons, on the premises during the raid.
Officers seized over 30,000 rubles ($386) in cash. They also confiscated gaming equipment, PCs, mobile phones, and the den’s makeshift financial records.
A spokesperson for the ministry’s Tver branch said police detained the suspects for questioning.
Investigators said they have identified six additional “administrators.” The spokesperson said the ministry’s investigation is ongoing and vowed to “expose all those involved.”
Earlier this month, the same ministry’s Khabarovsk branch charged a 51-year-old man with embezzling “a large sum of money from his cousin.”
Officers said the man offered to buy a car for his cousin. Instead, police say, he used all of his relative’s money to gamble in a casino.
