Terry McCrann on Crown Casino criminal accusations: Andrew Wilkie’s behaviour irresponsible

ANDREW Wilkie’s behaviour was disgraceful, utterly irresponsible and should lead to his expulsion from parliament if the major criminal accusations against Crown Casino cannot be substantiated.

ANDREW Wilkie’s behaviour was disgraceful, utterly irresponsible and should lead to his expulsion from parliament — if the major accusations of serious criminal acts cannot be substantiated.

What he did was much worse than a politician using “the coward’s castle” to just slime a person or business.

Wilkie was prepared to cause significant and all-too real financial damage to innocent investors on the basis of assertions which he admitted he did not know if they were true.

At one point on Wednesday, Crown shares were down 9 per cent — investors, real people — were losing over $700 million, thanks to Wilkie.

WILKIE ALLEGATIONS: CROWN ‘TAMPERERED WITH POKIE MACHINES’

Andrew Wilkie’s behaviour was utterly irresponsible and should lead to his expulsion from parliament if the major criminal accusations against Crown Casino cannot be substantiated. Picture: Kym Smith

He shredded his credibility even further by claiming that the allegations suggested a broader pattern of misbehaviour by the poker machine industry.

Let’s tease that out: he claims that Crown and only Crown is doing something wrong, so everybody with a poker machine is probably doing the same!

He provided not a shred of evidence for the claims of fiddling machines to generate more money for Crown, money laundering, drug taking, and one case of domestic violence.

The machine-fiddling is inherently improbable on so many grounds.

Money laundering is obviously a very big risk at a casino — just as it is at a bank, as we recently discovered.

But again, given the unprecedented video surveillance, it would have to be a very big conspiracy.