## Facts

- Four casino patrons played blackjack at an Atlantic City casino and were approached by uniformed security guards who accused them of being card counters.
- Plaintiffs testified that guards physically grabbed them (by collar and arms) and quickly removed them from the blackjack table, preventing some from retrieving chips.
- Plaintiffs were escorted to a nearby area and were flanked by multiple uniformed guards during the encounter.
- A games manager demanded identification to “register” plaintiffs as card counters and bar them from future blackjack play.
- When plaintiffs initially refused, the manager threatened arrest if they did not comply; plaintiffs then produced identification.
- Plaintiffs were told they would not be permitted to play blackjack again and were directed to leave the premises.
- Plaintiffs sued the casino and security employees for false imprisonment.
- Defendants moved for summary judgment, arguing a detention privilege analogous to a shopkeeper’s privilege and implied authorization or immunity under the Casino Control Act and regulations.

## Issues

1. Whether plaintiffs’ account of being forcibly removed, surrounded by guards, and threatened with arrest could establish an actionable restraint of liberty sufficient for a false-imprisonment claim.
2. Whether a casino has a common-law or statutory privilege to detain patrons suspected of card counting for investigative purposes.
3. Whether New Jersey’s casino regulatory scheme impliedly authorized or immunized the casino’s detention of suspected card counters, barring civil liability.

## Decision

- The court denied defendants’ motion for summary judgment.
- Accepting plaintiffs’ testimony as true for summary-judgment purposes, a jury could find that defendants unlawfully restrained plaintiffs’ freedom of movement by physical force and threatened arrest.
- The court declined to recognize a general detention privilege for suspected card counters, distinguishing shoplifting-based detention authority and noting card counting is not a crime.
- The court found no provision in the Casino Control Act or regulations that expressly authorized or immunized the type of detention alleged.

## Legal Principles

- False imprisonment is an unlawful restraint of a person’s freedom of movement and may be shown by physical force or threats that would cause a reasonable person to believe they are not free to leave; formal arrest is unnecessary.
- On summary judgment, the court must accept the nonmovant’s version of disputed facts; where those facts could support a finding of confinement, the claim proceeds to the jury.
- A private business’s authority to detain is not expanded by judicial analogy absent clear legal basis; any broad investigative detention power, particularly for noncriminal conduct, requires legislative authorization.
- Comprehensive regulatory oversight of an industry does not, by itself, create implied civil immunity or implied private detention powers without clear statutory or regulatory language.

## Conclusion

The court held that plaintiffs’ evidence of physical removal, guard presence, and threats of arrest could support a jury finding of false imprisonment and rejected both a claimed casino detention privilege for suspected card counting and implied immunity under the casino regulatory scheme.


Bartolo v. Boardwalk Regency Hotel Casino, Inc., 449 A.2d 1339 (N.J. Super. Ct. Law Div. 1982)