Associated Press
North Carolina law officers are turning up the heat on video sweepstakes parlors.
More law enforcement agencies plan Monday to begin enforcing a state Supreme Court decision upholding a ban on video sweepstakes machines.
Guilford County Sheriff BJ Barnes says his agency will start enforcing the state law outlawing the machines now that operators who have stayed in business during the court process were given time to wind down. Barnes says any sweepstakes parlor operators remaining in business could be arrested and prosecuted.
Sweepstakes halls have cropped up because of what state Supreme Court justices called a loophole since video poker machines were outlawed in 2007. The court ruled in two cases last month that a 2010 law banning sweepstakes machines as gambling also regulates the act of playing.
