Mike Bowers (left) and Chris Anulewicz of Balch & Bingham, Atlanta (Photos: John Disney/ALM and Handout)

The Georgia Court of Appeals has reversed gambling convictions of a 74-year-old restaurant owner whose family was forced into bankruptcy after the Macon circuit district attorney prosecuted him over the operation of nine coin-operated game machines.

Ronnie Bartlett, owner of the now-defunct Captain Jack's Crab Shack in Peach County, was one of a string of defendants charged with gambling offenses by District Attorney David Cooke, but the first who chose to fight rather then enter a plea, said Bartlett's attorney, Chris Anulewicz.

Anulewicz and former Georgia Attorney General Mike Bowers, who also represents Bartlett, contend that the appellate court's June 25 reversal is the first step in calling a halt to what they say is a pattern of similar, lucrative—and potentially abusive—prosecutions across the state that have been promulgated for nearly two decades by Decatur attorney Michael Lambros as a hired gun for local prosecutors.

Multiple district attorneys, including Cooke, have retained Lambros as a special assistant DA to seize coin-operated video games in raids on convenience stores and restaurants, file criminal charges and then push for the forfeiture of millions of dollars in seized assets that are eventually funneled into prosecutors' coffers, the two attorneys said.

Lambros said he is working for Cooke and is not authorized to comment on the case.

The commercial gambling charges against Bartlett and others are based on the premise that winners of the coin-operated games received cash prizes for playing games that require no skill on the part of the player—a misdemeanor offense under state law. Bartlett was charged with multiple felonies.

Until Bartlett's trial, Anulewicz said, other defendants facing similar charges brought by Lambros for DAs across the state have entered pleas with no jail time after agreeing to forfeit assets seized in raids of their businesses.

Bartlett was sentenced to five years after a jury convicted him last year. He has been free on an appeal bond but has been forced to wear an ankle monitor and his movements restricted to his home county, Anulewicz said.

“To my knowledge,every single case Cooke has otherwise gone forward with has no jail time or no prosecution—because everyone else pays rather than fights,” said Anulewicz—an assertion that Cooke later confirmed.

“Bartlett has no prior criminal arrests or convictions,” Anulewicz added. “Yet they asked for the maximum—and got it.”

In reversing Bartlett's 2018 convictions, Judge Carla McMillian wrote for a unanimous panel that the evidence “was insufficient as a matter of law” to support them.

McMillian's order noted that Bartlett's game machines were examined by an inspector with the Georgia Lottery Corp., which licenses use of coin-operated machines, who determined Bartlett was “operating only the appropriate types of games.”

A second expert also testified at Bartlett's trial that all the seized machines required the player to take some action in order to win a payout, the judge noted.

There is no provision in state law “that a cash payout would convert an otherwise legal [coin-operated amusement machine] into an illegal 'gambling device' that would have subjected Bartlett to prosecution,” McMillian held.

“Because the evidence is insufficient to enable a rational trier of fact to find Bartlett guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of the commercial gambling charges, it follows that the trial court erred in denying Bartlett's motion for a directed verdict of acquittal,” she concluded. Chief Judge Christopher McFadden and Judge Stephen Goss concurred.

Bartlett's Peach County restaurant was shut down in 2015 after Lambros, while working for Cooke, seized the restaurant's coin-operated games, according to a federal lawsuit the Bartletts filed against Cooke and Lambros last year.

A temporary receiver took control of the Bartletts' bank accounts and assets, and Lambros then filed a civil racketeering suit against the couple. He dismissed the suit after the Bartletts were forced into bankruptcy.

The Bartletts were not charged with any crime until 17 months after their restaurant was raided—and two months after they sued Cooke and Lambros.

Once the Bartletts were indicted, Cooke and Lambros sought and received a stay of the federal civil proceedings until the criminal charges are resolved.

On Friday, Cooke said that, while he respects the appellate court's ruling, “We disagree with it and plan to appeal.”

He said that Captain Jack's “could not be a solvent enterprise without engaging in illegal cash payouts.” Cooke also insisted that it is a misdemeanor to make what he continued to characterize as illegal cash payouts,  although he acknowledged Bartlett was not charged with any misdemeanor violations.

“We felt there was strong evidence of commercial gambling,” which is a felony, he said.

Cooke also said he agreed with the jury which “found there was sufficient evidence to hold Mr. Bartlett accountable for his crimes.”

“We believe a subsequent appellate decision that more closely examines the evidence will ultimately affirm that verdict,” he said.

Cooke confirmed that Lambros prosecuted Bartlett along with one of Cooke's assistant DAs. He also defended the lawyer's work for him as a special assistant DA, explaining that gambling prosecutions and the attendant civil racketeering claims to seize forfeited assets require “a high degree of expertise.”

Cooke said he has opposed a motion by Bartlett's lawyers to modify the conditions of Bartlett's appeal bond that would lift all restrictions currently in place against him, including the requirement that Bartlett wear an ankle monitor.

Cooke said he did so because, “There was sufficient evidence to support the verdict,” and he believes  a subsequent appellate decision “that more closely examines the evidence will ultimately affirm that verdict.”