Remember that scene in Back To The Future when Biff brought back the sports almanac and told his past self to bet on games that he already knew the outcome of?

While the real-life situation didn’t quite reach Biff-becoming-a-millionaire levels, an Atlantic City sportsbook was fined $20,000 after it was discovered that they took bets after the events were over.

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The culprit is William Hill Sportsbook, which backends betting at casinos like Caesar’s, Harrah’s, and the Tropicana. Documents from 2022 and 2023 identified 42 illicit bets in college basketball that were taken after the results came in. 

Many of those bets were voided but a handful were paid out up to $5,000 across six bets. The company also did the same with a pair of boxing matches and some hockey games, pulling in around $25,000 worth of bets for contests that were already completed. 

William Hill chalked up the mistake to OpenBet, who provides the system content such as the games and the times they start on their kiosks and app. 

Ultimately, it doesn’t sound like any one person walked out like Biff in this situation, but that doesn’t matter in this case. There’s no telling if this was anything more than a system error, but theoretically, if someone knew of a glitch in the system and continued to take small gains over time unnoticed, that would be a huge issue. Again, not saying that’s what was going on here, but that’s why all of this is heavily monitored and questionable actions are quickly flagged.

New Jersey is one of 38 states that allow sports betting. Since The Garden State welcomed legal betting on games, it has become the hotbed for sports enthusiasts, bringing in the most money compared to the other 37 states.