The Tropicana Casino and Resort in Atlantic City has fired a veteran casino worker who is suing the Casino for causing him lung cancer. He filed a civil suit against the Tropicana last year.
Vincent Rennich, 49, is claiming that more than 25 years of secondhand smoke gave him lung cancer. He has been one of the prominent advocates of a total smoking ban in Atlantic City’s 11 casinos. He has become for many a symbol of the casino anti-smoking movement.
Rennich, a table games supervisor, was fired over the weekend but he doesn't believe the casino that says that his dismissal was part of a larger staff reduction as the new owners reorganize the property.
"They threw me under the bus," said Rennich, who was diagnosed with lung cancer two years ago and had part of his lung removed. "They took the opportunity to get rid of me."
Mr. Rennich’s dismissal came a week after he spoke before the Senate Health Committee here in favor of a bill to eliminate the smoking exemption for casinos.
The Tropicana casino said it would not comment on Rennich’s dismissal or the other layoffs.
Smoking is to be restricted to no more than 25 percent of the gambling floor in Atlantic City casinos on April 15, unless an effort currently under way in the state legislature to ban all smoking in casinos is adopted by then.
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