Virginia Skill Game Player Goes Berserk After Losing, Faces Felony Charges
Posted on: October 6, 2025, 10:22h.
Last updated on: October 6, 2025, 10:22h.
- Police have arrested a man who attacked a Virginia skill game with an angle grinder
- Skill games remain controversial in Virginia despite a state Supreme Court ruling outlawing the machines
A man in Virginia who allegedly went bonkers inside a Martinsville gas station where controversial skill games were operating is now facing felony criminal charges.
On Sept. 27, the Henry County Sheriff’s Office responded to a 911 call regarding a threatening customer who had earlier been playing an unregulated skill gaming machine at the J&H Market located at 870 Preston Rd. Witnesses say the man, later identified as 41-year-old Thornton Burnette, of Martinsville, became irate after playing the slot-like terminal. He reportedly demanded that the cashier give him back his money while visibly armed with a gun.
After leaving the store, he returned a short time later with a cordless angle grinder. Employees and customers fled the store as Burnette allegedly used the grinder to damage the electronic gaming device.
Video surveillance confirmed Burnette’s actions, showing him using the grinder on the gaming machine and then smashing the screen,” the Henry County Sheriff’s Office release read.
Burnette was arrested and charged two days later, on Sept. 29, around 9:39 am, at his place of employment without incident.
Felon Faces Felony Charges
Law enforcement says its investigation of the matter determined that Burnette is a convicted felon, which authorized a warrant for his arrest.
Burnette is facing numerous felonies and other charges, including destruction of property, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, use of a firearm in the commission of a felony, possession of burglary tools, and attempted robbery.
Burnette is being held without bond in the Henry County Adult Detention Center. He’s not scheduled to appear in court until Dec. 11. He’s facing over a decade in prison.
Incident Highlights Ongoing Skill Game Dilemma
Skill games, at least as they previously operated in the commonwealth, are illegal in Virginia. The slot-like games primarily differed only in that the player needed to identify winning paylines, which proponents of the machines argued allowed the player to impact their payout rate and therefore rendered the games not ones of chance but aptitude.
State lawmakers temporarily allowed skill games to operate in the commonwealth to help struggling small businesses impacted by the pandemic. The allowance, however, terminated in July 2021. Legal challenges allowed the machines to operate past the deadline until the Virginia Supreme Court in October 2023 ruled that the games constituted illegal gambling.
Manufacturers of the games then got creative. With the state defining a “gambling machine” as a device “dependent upon the insertion of a coin or other object for its operation,” skill gaming firms developed machines that require the player to pay a cashier.
The new Queen of Virginia skill games force players to give cash to a cashier, who then remotely credits the machine for the person to play. Pace-O-Matic, the company behind the machines that many small businesses credit with helping them offset higher overhead, believes the money-to-cashier component satisfies the state’s gambling statute.
The Henry County Sheriff’s Office did not specify the type of gaming machine that Burnette was allegedly playing. The agency said only that the gaming room at the J&H Market “appeared to be used for illegal gambling.”
The Virginia Lottery did not respond to Casino.org’s inquiry as to whether the incident might jeopardize J&H Market’s lottery retailer license.
Last Comment ( 1 )
The craziest part of the story is that he had a job. The rest is expected from certain people