Tweet An Ontario court has ruled that evidence seized from the car of a person alleged to be connected to the Hell’s Angels can be admitted at trial even when that evidence was taken ostensibly under one piece of legislation, but was intended to be admitted for an investigation under other legislation. In November 2012, […]
Tweet Money Laundering Bulletin in the UK has a good article out today on the anti-corruption drive in China and its impact on the casinos in Macau, which explores the anti-money laundering lapses and lack of legislation in the gambling industry in Macau, and the corresponding increase of trade-based money laundering in China. Trade-based money laundering […]
Tweet Expectation of privacy In an odd decision out of Canada, a provincial level Supreme Court has ruled that a violent offender gambling at a public casino has an expectation of privacy when using his cellular phone to text despite the fact that gamblers are notified of being under surveillance when entering casinos. The decision […]
Tweet Banks driving compliance changes By Christine Duhaime, B.A., J.D., Financial Crime and Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist Follow @cduhaime According to this story in Reuters, banks in the US are reluctantly driving American casinos towards greater anti-money laundering compliance. Casinos are bank clients and pursuant to anti-money laundering legislation, banks have to monitor their clients’ transactions […]
Tweet Acquisition of PokerStars A Canadian company, Amaya Gaming Group Inc., announced it has entered into a $4.9 billion deal to acquire all of the shares of Oldford Group, the Isle of Man company that operates PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker. PokerStars was founded by Canadian Isai Scheinberg. Amaya said that it believes the transaction […]
Tweet According to a report released by McAfee Labs, available here entitled “Jackpot! Money Laundering Through Online Gambling,” the global online gambling sector appears to be rife with money laundering problems and Bitcoin is facilitating it. It may be that money laundering is happening on a large scale through unlicensed online gambling websites but the report […]
Tweet Law Commission notes violent methods of gambling debt collection According to a Consultation Paper prepared by the Law Reform Commission of Hong Kong, debt collection in Hong Kong is a significant and violent problem, mostly arising from gambling debts incurred locally and in Macau. Loan sharks in Macau and Hong Kong account for 21.4% […]
Tweet Surprising criminal conviction of two Hong Kong tycoons In a surprising decision, the Macau Court of First Instance has convicted two high-profile Hong Kong businessmen of money laundering. Joseph Lau Luen-hung, and Stephen Lo Kit-sing, each received a sentence of five years and three months in prison and were sentenced in absentia. Mr. Lau […]
Tweet Money laundering For junket operators Bloomberg has a great story on the rise and fall of Carson Yeung Ka-shing, the Hong Kong businessman and owner of the Birmingham City football club, convicted earlier this week of laundering $93 million through, inter alia, junket operators and casinos in Macau. Mr. Yeung was arrested in June […]
Tweet Money laundering is more prevalent than elsewhere According to a recent survey of business people who operate and do business in Hong Kong and Macau, money laundering is a huge problem and in fact, is more prevalent there than anywhere else in the world. The results of the survey which were reported in South China […]