Who Was Tommy Carmichael?
Carmichael was so taken by the top-bottom joint cheating tool that he ditched his current life to head to Las Vegas to put the gadget to work. Targeting the highest RTP slot machines, which cost five-cent a time to play, Carmichael managed to collect over $35. And with this, he used the rest of the weekend to use the tool on a multitude of slots in different casinos. However, the law quickly caught up with Carmichael, in Denny’s of all places. A nice, relaxing mid-afternoon coffee turned into several police officers frisking the form TV repair guy. They found his top-bottom joint, ignoring Carmichael’s please that it was a tool to start the car, and he ended up with five years in the slammer. Instead of prison reforming Carmichael, it gave him time to learn. He met Mike Balsamo, and together they formed a small collective of slot cheats who were ready to get to work on the outside. And with the likes of Bally and International Game Technology releasing a considerable collection of slot machines alongside video poker-based slots, there was plenty to go at. In the years that followed, Carmichael developed a device known as the Monkey Paw, designed to force video poker slots to pay out around $1,000 an hour. But, as technology evolved, Carmichael’s devices were rendered ineffective. The Light Wand was another prime example of a Carmichael invention. It tricked a slot machine’s sensor into paying out, with the tool being used worldwide in the 90s. But, again, disaster struck for Carmichael. You could say that he became too comfortable and confident. In 1996, he was sitting playing a slot machine at the Circus Circus hotel casino resort, but he was being watched unbeknown to him. And as soon as his cheating was caught on camera, the security team moved in to take him away. He received charges for possession of a cheating device and manufacturing a cheating device. Four years later, in the year 2000, Carmichael also received a sentence of 326 days in prison, with three years on probation and a three-year ban from casinos, For being involved as a principal member of a cheating operation designed to win money unfairly from casino venues in the US and beyond. These days, quite surprisingly, Carmichael is putting his expertise into developing tools to prevent cheating. For example, one of his anti-cheating devices, known as The Protector, effectively blocks the use of all other cheating devices. It’s quite the turnaround from Carmichael, who has taken casinos for millions over the years.
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