Casinos are facing increased regulatory scrutiny overall, of course, a state of affairs that they have grudgingly come to accept, and compliance was the key message at the conference this week.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re doing all the right things and you\u2019re appreciating the importance of these issues,\u201d said Juan Zarate, a former government official and author of Treasury\u2019s War: The Unleashing of a New Era of Financial Warfare<\/em>. \u201cBut my message to you is that these issues aren\u2019t going to go away.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\nThe casino industry is now viewed by the government as a \u201ccentral, important part of the international financial system,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Of course, the penalty for non-compliance is severe. In 2014, Las Vegas Sands Corp. (LVS) was fined a record $47.4 million for record-high anti-money-laundering violations. More recently, Caesars Entertainment received a $9.5 million fine for similar charges.<\/p>\n
In February, former manager of the Sparks Nugget, Michonne Ascuaga, resigned from her position on the Nevada Gaming Control Board, after a FinCEN investigation found \u201csystematic\u201d and \u201cegregious\u201d violations at the casino while she had been in charge of the Northern Nevada property. It has since been sold.<\/p>\n
Regulations Apply to All<\/strong><\/h2>\nThese two most recent cases illustrate that money laundering is an issue for huge casino resorts and smaller gaming establishments alike, no matter if you\u2019re Caesars, the Sparks Nugget, or a California card club, said Jeffrey Settner, a lawyer specializing in white-collar crime.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhether you\u2019re in Las Vegas, Nevada. . . Emeryville, California . . . Sparks, Pahrump, wherever. . . crimes do occur, and sometimes people will spend illegal gains at your casino,\u201d Setness said. \u201cYou don\u2019t have to be a huge casino [to be held accountable] . . . you still have the same type of requirements.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\nHeroin Bust in Delaware Underscores the Issues<\/strong><\/h2>\nBut while at the conference, the industry declared its eagerness for compliance, across the country in Delaware, authorities were announcing the arrest of eleven suspects in relation to one of the largest seizures of heroin in the state\u2019s history,<\/p>\n
An investigation comprising numerous law enforcement agencies had uncovered 116,675 bags of the drug with a street value of $1,166,750. Police said the suspects had used casinos to launder proceeds of the illegal operation. No doubt this kind of massive crime case will only make FinCEN more on its toes, ever watching, like a kind of federal eye-in-the-sky, giving casinos a taste of their own surveillance medicine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Bank Secrecy Act Conference at the South Point in Las Vegas this week drew legal representatives from across the casino industry to discuss the issue of anti-money-laundering compliance. In the news frequently of late, perhaps most notably following the massive cyber bank heist of the New York Fed back in February, where money allegedly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":36038,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,10,18],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n
LV Conference Tackles Gaming Anti-Money Laundering Measures<\/title>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\t\n