Justice Luiz Fux voted Thursday to preserve Brazil’s ban on operating in-person gambling businesses such as bingo halls, slot-machine venues, casinos and the jogo do bicho lottery. The case was then suspended after Justice Flávio Dino requested more time to review the matter and argued that online betting platforms, known as bets, should be considered in the same debate.
The case is before Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court (STF), the country’s highest court. The justices are examining whether the classification of gambling operations as a criminal misdemeanor under a 1941 law conflicts with individual freedoms protected by Brazil’s 1988 Constitution.
Fux said the prohibition remains constitutional. He argued that gambling can cause social and economic harm to players and their families, while clandestine operations may also be linked to organized crime and money laundering.
“In gambling, the player becomes an unconscious protagonist of his own harm,” Fux said, according to O Globo.
Dino’s Proposal
Dino agreed with Fux on preserving the misdemeanor classification for in-person gambling. He also proposed that the court establish standards for legal exceptions created by Congress, including lotteries and other gambling activities authorized by specific legislation.
Those standards would apply, in Dino’s view, to legislation that authorized online betting platforms. His proposed safeguards include taxes directed partly to Brazil’s public health system, the SUS, for prevention and treatment of gambling addiction; integrity rules to prevent match-fixing and conflicts of interest; advertising restrictions during times when children and teenagers are likely to be watching; warnings about addiction risks; and a ban on algorithms designed to encourage compulsive betting.
Fux said he was open to a joint ruling. He noted that two other cases involving bets are also under his jurisdiction but have not yet been scheduled for judgment. He said he would check whether those cases could be placed on the court’s docket.
Dino’s request gives him up to 90 days to return the case for judgment, meaning the STF may not resume the review until November.
Case’s Wider Impact
The dispute began with a case involving a man accused of operating slot machines in a bar in São Leopoldo, in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul. A state special criminal appeals court acquitted him after finding that the 1988 Constitution had effectively ended the misdemeanor classification by protecting individual liberties.
That interpretation was later used in other gambling cases in Rio Grande do Sul. In 2016, the STF recognized the case as having “general repercussion,” meaning its eventual ruling will guide courts across Brazil. At least 2,728 cases in different courts have been paused pending the Supreme Court’s decision.
Brazil’s prosecutor general, Paulo Gonet, has argued that operating in-person gambling businesses should remain a criminal misdemeanor. Speaking before the STF on Wednesday, he cited the increase in gambling addiction and said the prohibition protects bettors, their assets and their families.
This article is based on single-source reporting from O Globo.