The former director of Suncity Group’s cage, Ho Cheng I, told a Macau court on Tuesday that she did not participate in any activities involving telephone betting and was not aware that accounts may have been related to Universal e-City when she processed a large number of customer refunds in July 2020.
Ho has been charged with illegal gambling.
The Philippines-based Universal e-City, which offered proxy betting services, is alleged to have been linked to Suncity as its online gaming portal. But defendants, including Alvin Chau, have repeatedly stated that Universal e-City is a separate company that merely maintained a friendly relationship with the group.
According to evidence tendered in the courtroom, in July 2020 there was a “wave of refunds” – also known as a bank run – from Suncity Group, with a large number of people who had deposited money in Suncity accounts demanding refunds.
Ho said Tuesday there were so many customers who came to Suncity to withdraw their money that Suncity created a Money Compliance Committee, which included Alvin Chau, Lou Seak Fong and Loi Vincent. The prosecution argued that the committee was involved in telephone betting activities.
As reported by Inside Asian Gaming at the time, Chau had, in July 2020, recorded a seven-minute long video message in which he took the unprecedented step of disclosing the finances of Suncity VIP Club following rumors the group had been targeted by mainland Chinese authorities, that those authorities possessed information of their customers and that Suncity was unable to cover the financial deposits of its clients.
Chau denied all of those rumors, stating, “We have the capability and enough capital to offset any bad debts and chip deposits of all clients. I would like to reiterate that Suncity is a very stable financial platform.”
Ho told the court that when a customer went to Suncity to withdraw money, the money compliance committee would review the customer’s information, and if the customer was a shareholder of Suncity, there would be someone to follow up. However, she stressed that she was simply handling the deposits and withdrawals for the customer and did not have the authority to approve the customer’s account, nor did she have the authority to know the approval process, let alone whether the customer was related to telephone betting.
“In July 2020, the company had problems with its funds, and in October 2020, it received a notice from its superiors to assist customers of Universal e-City to withdraw their money,” she said. Ho pointed out that her supervisor was the eighth defendant, Wong Pak Ling, but she said she did not know why she had to assist Universal e-City.
She explained that some customers had asked to transfer money from their Universal e-City accounts to their Suncity accounts, but she did not know that it was illegal to help them withdraw their money.
“If it involved telephone betting, I would not have done it,” she said.
She also pointed out that she did not know that Universal e-City was operating a telephone betting business and thought it was just an overseas VIP room.
The eleventh defendant in the case, Suncity’s deputy director of operations, Leong Su Weng, is accused of participating in “betting under the table” and telephone betting. He said in his defense that he was not involved in either.
However, the prosecution presented evidence that Leung had contacted Cheong Chi Kin and mentioned that a customer had engaged in betting under the table. Leong explained, “If a customer had a request for betting under the table, I would have contacted the betting company and Cheong Chi Kin, but I was not involved in it.”
The prosecution asked, “Does this mean you knew about the betting under the table?”
Leong replied, “If you go into a casino, you will see many people betting under the table.”
