Appeals judges hear arguments on video poker

The lawyer for an Fayetteville amusement machine vendor said in court Wednesday that North Carolina lacks a consistent public policy toward gambling when it allows Cherokee Indians to run video poker machines while banning such gaming everywhere else.

lawyers for the state and the vendor traded arguments before the state Court of Appeals over the legality of a 2006 state law that made machines illegal except on the Cherokee reservation, west of Asheville. A trial court judge in Wake County overturned the law in February.

The three-member appeals panel peppered vendor attorney Hugh Stevens with pointed questions about a federal American Indian gambling law that provides the basis for the state's agreement with the Cherokees that allows the tribe to operate a casino. At several points in the hearing, the judges appeared highly skeptical of Stevens’ position that the state law should be struck down.

More after the jump .

----- 

Special Deputy Attorney General Mark Davis, representing Gov. Beverly Perdue, said the ban is legal and consistent with the federal gambling act and that state legislators had acted well within their discretion to set public policy for the state.

With the court’s usual quarters across from the Old State Capitol under renovations, the hearing was held in a small conference room in a Fayetteville Street office tower. More than 20 county sheriffs from across the state packed the temporary courtroom to show their opposition to overturning the state’s ban on poker machines, while members of the media were relegated to watching the court proceedings on television monitors in a nearby kitchen.

It could be weeks or months before the judges rule in the case, which could have far-ranging implications on the legality of gambling in the state.