A ruling by the American Arbitration Association (AAA) has approved the certification of 112 casinos as a class, clearing arbitration to decide on a class-action antitrust suit against gaming supplier Light & Wonder over its automated shufflers.
The lawsuit, originally filed in 2020 by the Tonkawa Indians, an Oklahoma tribal casino operator, claims that L&W (known as Scientific Games at the time of the filing) relied on faulty patent claims to establish its near monopoly on automated shufflers. That stifled competition and allowed for overcharging of the equipment. Scientific Games at the time began selling the shufflers after the acquisition of the former Shuffle Master.
The arbitration association’s ruling means the case can go before a single arbitrator, eliminating the need for 112 separate filings. Attorneys for L&W had claimed that the individual arbitration contracts are too dissimilar to allow the class to be certified.
But arbitrator John Wilkinson of the AAA, in a ruling issued on 9 December and announced on 17 December, held that the number of casinos that have signed on to the litigation is “far in excess of what is required” for a class action, citing court precedents that held 40 members can legally constitute a class.
L&W: Not all complaints the same
Attorneys for L&W previously argued that the arbitrator ignored precedent and didn’t take into consideration that each prospective member of the class likely had different contentions. Wilkinson disagreed, deeming those differences as “narrow”.
According to a report in Reuters, the casinos may be the first-ever certified antitrust arbitration class.
A separate lawsuit filed in Chicago federal District Court is pursuing antitrust claims, also around automated shufflers, against L&W on behalf of more than 1,000 casinos. Those casinos did not seek arbitration; they are pursuing certification as a class in the traditional courts. US District Judge John Kness has yet to rule on the certification motion in that case.
Light & Wonder plans to appeal Wilkinson’s class certification ruling to the New York State Supreme Court.
