Much of the focus of government attention and media coverage of money laundering through B.C. casinos has been on the River Rock in Richmond.
But regardless of the size of the casino, when cash moves through it and the funds are not sourced, concerns are raised about money laundering.
“The issue was that nobody was asking that to the degree that we expect,” said David Eby, the province’s attorney general, in an interview with the Tri-City News after it was revealed that the Hard Rock Casino Vancouver, located in Coquitlam, dealt with over over $2 million in cash — most of it unsourced — in 2016 and 2017 before new rules stemmed the flow. “You are still allowed to bring in large amounts of cash — you just have to prove where the money is coming from.”
Unsourced funds have been a major source of concern for years, Eby told The News, and the Dirty Money report by Peter German suggested the problem was widespread, with VIP gamblers from China acquiring cash from gangs, often in small denominations, and repaying the debt through accounts in China. A police investigation found the funds sitting in a bank account in China were used to buy precursor chemicals for drugs.
Since crackdown on the source of funds earlier this year — one of German’s interim recommendations — gambling proceeds are down in B.C, Eby said.
While Eby said it’s also possible that the cash coming through the Hard Rock Casino Vancouver in Coquitlam in previous years was obtained legally, through a cash-based business (or the gambler could be very wealthy), he said more needs to be done to crack down on money laundering and terms of reference will soon be announced for a second round of investigations by German, this time in the real estate, horse racing and luxury car industries.
“It’s gone somewhere,” Eby said of illegal funds, noting that bank drafts are another source of concern because they could be sold to a banned gambler at a mark-up.
Eby said he feels some comfort in knowing suspicious cash transactions have been reduced because it was an ongoing problem that put B.C. casinos at risk for money laundering.
“We had a systemic issue in B.C. of failing to direct casinos to do the obvious, when there’s a large amount of cash and you don’t know where it came from you should refuse to accept it.”
