Temperatures rise in bingo trial

Local News

September 20, 2006

By Kelly Foreman The Richmond Register Wed Sep 20, 2006, 11:55 AM EDT

After listening to six days of testimony against her, defendant Gloria Williams spoke Tuesday to allegations of bingo fraud and tax evasion.

“I’ve heard it all and none of it is true,” she said.

Testimony became emotional Tuesday from Williams in a case charging she and her sister, Rita Tipton, with bingo fraud and tax evasion during the final days of a federal trial against them. The defendants both testified Tuesday on their own behalf before a jury and U.S. District Judge Jennifer Coffman.

Williams tearfully explained the emotional damage caused to her grandchildren by Internal Revenue Service investigators during a search of her home, alleged sexual harassment from a former Jackpot Charity Bingo co-worker and became embroiled with Assistant U.S. Attorney Ken Taylor during his cross-examination Tuesday.

“My two young granddaughters were at home with me on spring break,” Williams said between tears as she described the day of the search. “They (IRS investigators) treated my kids terrible. They put them in an 8x10 room all day. At the time they were 6 and 7 years old and they’ll never forget it.”

Williams said she did not have the education to read and understand her tax returns or quarterly reports prepared by charities that played bingo at the Waco bingo hall.

“I’ve never done one. I don’t know how,” Williams said of the reports.

Williams said she previously volunteered for two ladies’ auxiliary organizations playing at the bingo hall before her health kept her from attending. After bingo was over, she, Tipton and other sisters and friends would clean the building and stay into early morning hours playing a Rook card game, she said.

Throughout questioning from defense attorney Michael Dean and Taylor, Williams maintained she had no knowledge of illegal pull tabs sold at the facility, made no scheme with her sister to defraud the government and was never paid for the work she did at Jackpot Charity Bingo. Williams said she did gamble at various casinos, but remained adamant the records from casinos indicating substantial losses were incorrect and misleading.

“You’ve sort of poo-pooed these records as having to be false, but you used these very forms to prove how much you lost, didn’t you?” Taylor asked, referring to the losses listed by Williams on her tax returns.

Williams said she did not know.

“How would a person fill the (tax returns) out without knowing how much you lost?” Taylor said.

The preparer, whom Williams could not recall, could have estimated the numbers, she said.

“So they came up with a figure out of thin air?” Taylor said.

“That’s how it was,” Williams replied.

When asked about testimony implicating her in the crimes, Williams alleged witnesses' statements were false.

“She’s a fanatical liar,” Williams said about Tipton’s former daughter-in-law, Selena King.

Her brother, Bill Henry; another witness, Joe Etta Bird; Tipton’s granddaughter, witness Tara Tipton; and members of the Kentucky Office of Charitable Gaming also were lying in their testimony against Williams, she said.

“It’s all a big conspiracy to frame you all?” Taylor said.

“Exactly,” Williams replied.

Tipton remained calm as she explained to the jury how Jackpot Charity Bingo evolved out of a wealthy man’s wish to keep her financially secure.

“We were out riding around one day and it was a corn field,” Tipton said of she and former boyfriend, Arnold Croucher. “We decided to buy it because he said one day it would be a valuable piece of property.”

After several years of running bingo out of the building on Irvine Road in Waco, Tipton said the business was conveyed to her son, Michael Tipton, in 1992.

“My boyfriend and me sat down and talked about it and made the decision,” Tipton said. “With my education it was going to be hard for me to run a business that size.”

Tipton said she only went through the seventh grade.

After being told not to work at the bingo hall by OCG inspectors, Tipton said she only went to the building to visit her son while he was working concessions, to clean the building and to play cards. Tipton said her gambling losses reported by the casinos were wrong, she wasn’t in charge of bingo and gave her tax returns to Williams for someone else to fill out.

“Did you make a living off stealing bingo money?” Dean asked Tipton.

“No sir,” she said, with a laugh. “I would not take no money that should go to a charity.”

Taylor did not have an opportunity to cross-examine Tipton before the end of trial Tuesday. The following witnesses also testified for the defense Tuesday:

• Patsy Woolum, bingo volunteer and former president of the Waco Volunteer Fire Department Ladies’ Auxiliary. Woolum said the auxiliary performs a variety of functions, including the funding of medical, utility and funeral bills for the needy and the purchase of school supplies and Christmas presents for the less fortunate. Woolum said the organization is not a front for Rita Tipton and most of the charity’s money comes from bingo proceeds.

During cross-examination, Taylor asked why the charity had given several thousand dollars to pay for medical bills and property purchases from Woolum’s husband and two volunteers, Pam and Bill Goosey. Woolum said anyone who showed a need for the money got it.

• Crystal Henegar, bingo bookkeeper and player. Henegar said she volunteered for the Madison County Ruritan Club on bingo nights at Jackpot Charity Bingo. She said she was never paid for her time, was never influenced by Tipton and didn’t know of anything dishonest at the bingo hall.

In cross-examination, Taylor inquired into payments made to several members of Henegar’s family for medical bills by the Ruritan club, as he had with Woolum.

“Your family was getting a substantial amount of money from the Ruritan club,” Taylor said.

Henegar said it was all money that went to the doctors or was spent for needed medical expenses.

• Mary Mattox, sister of Williams and Tipton and bingo volunteer. Mattox said prosecution witness Joe Etta Byrd made allegations against her sisters because she held a grudge against the family. Mattox said Byrd was suing Mattox, Williams and Tipton’s brother's (Bill Henry) insurance company because of a wreck the two were in. Mattox testified in the case and Byrd received no money, Mattox said.

Taylor asked Mattox whether she knew if her sisters were getting money from bingo and how she knew they were not.

“I know they don’t,” she said. “You would have to know us as a family.”

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