At Casino, Children Now Closely Watched

PRIMM, Nev. — In the Old West, she might have stood away from the campfire glare, looking out for danger across the desert floor while the others slept comfortably.

But in the New West, Becky Gonzales is standing the midnight-to-1 a.m. watch in the bowels of a boisterous casino, keeping an eagle eye on her high-strung brood of four young teenagers as they move from one arcade game to the next.

“In an hour, my sister will come down, and I’ll go upstairs to the casino to play,” she says. “No way will we let these kids stay down here on their own. Not after last week.”

It’s the Sunday side of midnight and, at the Primadonna Resort children’s arcade, the few kids who are playing appear to be accompanied by an adult or, at least, an older teenager.

What a difference a week--and a murder--can make.

Eight days ago, over the Memorial Day Holiday weekend, 7-year-old Sherrice Iverson of Los Angeles was raped and strangled in the women’s bathroom of the Primadonna arcade--while her father gambled upstairs.

An 18-year-old Long Beach man, Jeremy Strohmeyer, was arrested three days later in Iverson’s killing. (Strohmeyer is being held in the infirmary at Men’s Central Jail, sheriff’s officials said Sunday, because he is a high-profile inmate who must be isolated from the jail’s general population.)

In the wake of the slaying, there now seem to be fewer children--especially unsupervised ones--in the casino arcades at this state-line gambling pit stop that straddles Interstate 15.

“Just because these casinos have arcades doesn’t mean it makes sense to leave your children in them alone,” said Andre Rios of South Gate, watching over Emma, 9, and Andrea, 1 1/2, while his wife, Dora, gambled on the floor above. “What happened here last week, that was a reality check. They say this [casino] is a family atmosphere, but does that mean you can leave your kids alone? No.”

The most obvious evidence that the slaying had a chilling effect on parents: the Primadonna’s 24-hour children’s arcade was in little demand after midnight these past Friday and Saturday nights.

One hotel security officer remarked: “It’s real quiet. The Memorial weekend was far more typical of what you could expect--kids everywhere. But the killing is still on everybody’s mind. Give everyone a month or so, though. People will forget. The kids will be back.”

At the Primadonna’s pool, a sign warns in capital letters: “No children under the age of 14 without adult supervision!” However, there is no similar sign at the entrance to the game arcade.

While the spotlight of tragedy may have quieted the Primadonna arcade, children were still being left to their own wits in the arcade at Whiskey Pete’s, on the other side of the freeway.

Whiskey Pete’s arcade is situated in a back corner of the casino floor, a glass wall separating kids playing Street Fighter II and The Simpsons on video machines from their parents on the video poker and slot machines.

A 13-year-old, armed with a roll of quarters, says at midnight that she is watching over two younger ones--3 and 9--until her parents grow tired of gambling and decided to return home to Ontario. She is still there at 3 a.m.

Nearby, four Los Angeles children between the ages of 16 and 9--three siblings and a cousin--have been playing in the arcade since 11 p.m. Saturday, while their moms work the slots. The children will still be there at 4 a.m., becoming quite expert on a basketball free-throw game.

“Our moms were a little skeptical about leaving us here,” said the 16-year-old. “But they check on us every half-hour or so.”

When a reporter later approaches one of the mothers, he is shooed away.

Other children played with moms and dads glued to their sides.

Darlene LaPage of Riverside stood like a hawk over her 9-year-old daughter, Mellissa, at the Buffalo Bill’s arcade--the largest of the three at Primm, named for the family that runs all three state-line casinos.

“I use to watch Mellissa from a little farther away, and then get up every once in a while and check on her,” LaPage said. “But after last week? I’m right here, right next to her.”

Nearby, two Riverside teenage boys are 2-in-the-morning tank commanders in an interactive video shoot ‘em up called “Tokyo Wars.” In between them sits dad Ray Kilcher, blasting away in his own tank. “Not only would I not leave my boys alone,” Kilcher said, “but I love playing these games too.”

Unlike Saturday night, several preteen children appeared to be playing without parental supervision at the Buffalo Bill’s arcade on Friday. A security guard almost constantly stood watch outside the arcade entrance, or patrolled within the maze of games.

By 3 Saturday morning, one set of siblings had been collected by their dad, and a pair of boys who looked like 10-year-old twins were wandering around on the fringe of the casino floor, seeming unsure what to do or where to go but also not seeming to care.

The guard said the county’s midnight curfew for unsupervised children did not apply to casino arcades--a contention disputed by Clark County prosecutors and local police who say they are too busy, in any event, to enforce curfew laws inside casinos.

For some parents, it is a moot issue.

“This will never be a place for kids,” said Mary Wilson, who with husband Marvin had driven from Long Beach--and left the teenagers at home with adult children. “You wanna take your kids somewhere? Take ‘em to Disneyland or Sea World.”

Most of the unsupervised children this past weekend seemed to have been left in arcades by adults who came here just to gamble for a few hours without booking a room, and then return home to California. That was LeRoy Iverson’s plan a week previous, when he brought Sherrice and her 14-year-old brother to state-line, only to leave them untended for hours.

At the Primadonna arcade early Sunday morning, Lawrence Rodriguez, 19, was keeping tabs on Tiffany, 15, while the parents gambled upstairs.

“It’s an all-nighter,” he said. From 10 p.m. to 1 a.m., the two had spent $40 on 25-cent games. “We’d rather be here than back home in Rialto,” he said.

Perhaps the most unusual sight occurred at 3:40 a.m. Saturday: an unsupervised 11-year-old boy with three younger siblings--including one in a baby stroller--inside the arcade at Whiskey Pete’s. A bewildered-looking security guard kept close watch over them.

After about half an hour, the mother appeared.

The woman, Guadalupe Vasquez, explained later that the family had driven from Barstow late Saturday night so her husband could gamble. She and the four children--ages 11, 5, 4 and one month--stayed inside the car.

“We thought he’d lose his money real fast, but after two hours he was still in there so we went inside to eat,” said the oldest boy, Marcos. Afterward, mom parked the kids in the arcade so she could look for her husband.

Were the kids worried? “No,” said Marcos confidently. “The officer was there, watching us, the whole time.”