A man cannot redeem nearly $60,000 in chips from a now-defunct casino that he bought at an online auction because they were "pilfered" by an employee of a company who was supposed to destroy them, a New Jersey appellate panel has ruled.

The man tried to cash in the 389 chips in January 2023 with the state Treasury Department's Unclaimed Property Administration, which was responsible for covering the redemption value of outstanding chips the Playboy Hotel and Casino had issued to patrons while in operation from 1981 to 1984. As part of its closing, the casino had transferred funds to the UPA to cover such redemptions.

The man told the UPA he had bought the chips — which were worth $59,500 — at an online auction and did not know their source. New Jersey State Police eventually determined that the casino had hired a company that was supposed to destroy the chips after it closed, but a former employee of that company “had pilfered several boxes of unused chips” sometime around 1990 and put them in a bank deposit box, the appellate panel noted.

The ex-employee told authorities that he later declared bankruptcy and forgot about the bank deposit box. The bank where the chips were stored opened the box in 2010 and confiscated the chips, eventually sending them to the auction house from which Hawkins purchased them.

The UPA rejected the man's claim in June 2023, noting the chips had not been issued to patrons in the normal course of casino operations.

The man appealed the decision, claiming in part that the UPA had relied on insufficient evidence and acted arbitrarily and capriciously, But in its ruling issued April 1, the appellate court said the man was not entitled to the funds because he did not present chips that had been issued by the casino.