Parramatta pub gave $8000 cash loans and free grog to gamblers

A Parramatta pub has been fined over $100,000 after a thieving employee revealed how they kept problem gamblers pumping money into poker machines.

Pokie players were fed free grog and cigarettes and ­granted cash loans from the safe of a Western Sydney pub.

Company RC One Pty Ltd has this week been fined $107,358 after a thieving employee reported Parramatta’s Rose and Crown Hotel to ­Liquor & Gaming NSW.

Between 2017 and 2018, pub staff allowed at least $145,000 in credit and debit withdrawals from the bar’s eftpos machine, loaned money from the safe to gamblers, and provided free ­alcohol and cigarettes to keep gamblers happy.

According to agreed facts in the decision, the hotel’s general manager, Sammantha Lee Glynn, was also manipulating the poker machine payout system by changing the values on leftover credit tickets and creating fake tickets, allegedly stealing up to $400,000.

Parramatta’s Rose and Crown Hotel manager Paul Camkin was fined $10,000 and disqualified for 12 months from being a licensee or being the approved manager of a hotel.

When Ms Glynn was suspended in October 2018, both the Independent Liquor & Gaming Authority and NSW Police uncovered a host of breaches.

ILGA chair Phil Crawford said the hotel lacked oversight and controls by those in charge.

“Staff used phantom transactions to mask cash withdrawals for gambling, but even more incredibly, they gave out loans from the safe,” Mr Crawford said.

“At one point a manager loaned a total of $8000 from the pub’s safe, to a patron who wanted to keep playing the pokies.

“A security guard also used the safe to loan $800 to another gambler.”

Parramatta’s Rose and Crown Hotel, which the Independent Liquor and Gaming Authority has found was giving cash loans, free cigarettes and free alcohol to pokie addicts.

The investigation also revealed the pub allowed gamblers to hit the pokies and drink on the morning of Good Friday, 2019, breaching liquor laws.

NSW Police charged Ms Glynn with theft totalling $15,000 and she was sentenced to an 18-month intensive corrections order in March 2021.

Under liquor laws Ms Glynn can’t be pursued by the ILGA because she was a low level manager, not a licensee or owner.

In a decision published on Friday, senior manager Paul Camkin was fined $10,000 and disqualified for 12 months from being a licensee or approved manager of a hotel.

The Rose and Crown’s Jason Marlow was given a reprimand and ordered to pay the costs of the authority’s investigation.

His biography on the Marlow Hotel Group’s website claims he is “among the most highly-respected hotel and operations managers in the business”. Two close associates, Jason Marlow and Damien Kelly, were given a reprimand and, along with Mr Camkin, ordered to pay the costs of the authority’s investigation.

The complaints related to not being fit and proper persons and associates under the Liquor Act as they were aware of Ms Glynn’s actions.

Mr Camkin and Mr Marlow became aware of the practice in August 2018 and commenced an audit and investigation.

“The hotel was essentially facilitating cash advances for gambling via a system of fake transactions and this is an ­obvious risk for problem gambling,” Mr Crawford said.

The pub is part of the Marlow Hotel Group.

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Originally published as Parramatta pub gave $8000 cash loans and free grog to gamblers