Room inspections are nothing new in Las Vegas, being the norm at many on-strip properties since 2017. In that way, the article perhaps misses the point.
What was new this year were many reports of aggressive, confrontational behavior by security at Resorts World specifically. In particular, there are quite a few stories of Resorts World security staff actively escalating confrontations and of calling over armed colleagues over resistance as minor as asking to see ID. This kind of thing is extremely worrying from a licensed security force with armed members, and suggests a serious defect in the training and security leadership at Resorts World. The problem was not room checks per se, it was the incompetence the people doing the checks repeatedly demonstrated.
I think the press may have been reticent to level accusations at specific resort operators, but I hope journalists will put some pressure on Resorts World. Do they normally mount this type of response to high-risk events? Who planned their handling of DEFCON? Are their security staff trained in deescalation? What is their policy on when and how trespass threats should be issued?
The overall feeling was that the Resorts World security department was exceptionally unprofessional and, through their confrontational behavior, made this into far more of a scandal than it should ever have been. Caesars security, by contrast, is downright militarized, but seems to have been far better trained and more graceful in their handling of similar situations.
What was new this year were many reports of aggressive, confrontational behavior by security at Resorts World specifically. In particular, there are quite a few stories of Resorts World security staff actively escalating confrontations and of calling over armed colleagues over resistance as minor as asking to see ID. This kind of thing is extremely worrying from a licensed security force with armed members, and suggests a serious defect in the training and security leadership at Resorts World. The problem was not room checks per se, it was the incompetence the people doing the checks repeatedly demonstrated.
I think the press may have been reticent to level accusations at specific resort operators, but I hope journalists will put some pressure on Resorts World. Do they normally mount this type of response to high-risk events? Who planned their handling of DEFCON? Are their security staff trained in deescalation? What is their policy on when and how trespass threats should be issued?
The overall feeling was that the Resorts World security department was exceptionally unprofessional and, through their confrontational behavior, made this into far more of a scandal than it should ever have been. Caesars security, by contrast, is downright militarized, but seems to have been far better trained and more graceful in their handling of similar situations.