Ex-Star boss says illegal activities at casino ‘not on my radar’

Former Star Entertainment boss Matt Bekier says there was nothing on his ‘radar’ about illegal activities occurring at the casino, despite a warning from one of the company’s lawyers.

Former Star Entertainment boss Matt Bekier leaving the Federal Court.

Former Star Entertainment chief executive Matt Bekier says there was nothing on his “radar” about illegal activities including suspicious cash transactions occurring at Star Sydney, despite a warning from one of the company’s top lawyers.

The Federal Court heard that in May 2018 Star casino boss Greg Hawkins forwarded an email to Mr Bekier from in-house counsel Andrew Power, who warned that the exchange of cash for chips in a private gaming room known as Salon 95 exposed the company to money laundering risks.

ASIC is suing Mr Bekier and eight other former executives and directors of Star Entertainment for breach of duties in relation to money laundering controls at the company’s casinos in Sydney, Brisbane and the Gold Coast.

Mr Bekier denied telling Star’s general counsel Paula Martin, when cash transactions were subsequently suspended at Salon 95 in order to improve procedures, that he wanted those transactions to be reinstated as soon as ­possible.

“I have no recollection of that conversation and I would suggest it’s unlikely that I would have said that to Ms Martin because she was not in a position to affect that,” said Mr Bekier. “I had no view on cash transactions. I wanted that room to do what it was intended to do and deliver the business case as it had been presented to us.”

Mr Bekier also said had no recollection of Ms Martin telling him that NSW Police would visit Salon 95, which was being run by Asian junket operator Suncity, to conduct an investigation.

Mr Bekier said he knew transactions occurring at places other than the casino cage raised the issue of money laundering risks and that “chips are being issued by people that have no right to issue those chips”. A cage is a secured area where financial transactions are conducted under supervision and where players can exchange cash for chips.

But he said he did not see the need to inform the board of the email from Mr Power or that Suncity had been sent a warning letter about Salon 95 because he believed “management was managing the situation”.

He said had he been aware of large transactions occurring at Salon 95 – including CCTV footage of cash arriving in bags – he would have informed the board. He said other members of his executive team had the duty to bring those issues to his attention.

“At this point, for me, it wasn’t clear that these risks had arisen,” Mr Bekier told the court. “There were potential risks there if we had not mitigated them, but my understanding from the conversation with Mr Hawkins was that those risks would be managed. So there wasn’t anything on my radar that gave me any concern.

Former Star Entertainment boss Matt Bekier is being sued by ASIC.

“I would not want to profess that I read this email (from Mr Hawkins) in detail or turned my mind to specific laws that might have been broken.

“I focused on the action steps that were set out to mitigate those risks. I had a consistent view of certain issues arising that had been identified that would be ­mitigated.”

Mr Bekier said when he became aware through media reports that Suncity founder Alvin Chau had been detained and his visa refused he was concerned about whether Star would be paid, as well as the impact on probity. But his view was that it was “just industry chatter” and did not need to be raised by anybody.

Mr Bekier, under questioning from ASIC lead counsel Dr Ruth Higgins, said he believed there had been a breakdown of various processes at Salon 95.

He told the court he was aware a report from KPMG prepared for the company had highlighted the high risk of using junket operators, but believed Star’s process of vetting such operators was in “good shape”.

Mr Bekier said he did not accept KPMG’s view that customers who brought large amounts of cash into the casino increased the risk of money laundering.

But notwithstanding that, the fact that junkets almost exclusively played on credit, and not cash, could reduce such risks, he said.

“I remember the discussion at the time that I had with our team and KPMG, and I think our team put forward the argument that said we have a number of customers that we know really well that are very rich, that are able to bring in large amounts of cash,” Mr Bekier said.

“That didn’t automatically mean that they were higher risk because they were bringing more cash than other customers.”

The court heard earlier that Mr Bekier was told there was “nothing to worry about” in relation to allegations that Suncity had links to criminal organisations. Star’s board in 2018 approved increasing Suncity’s credit cashing facilities from $50m to $80m.

But Mr Bekier accepted that the KPMG report demonstrated deficiencies in Star’s money laundering and terrorism financing risk assessment processes in relation to junkets.

Originally published as Ex-Star boss says illegal activities at casino ‘not on my radar’