A malfunction caused four casino ATMs to hand out more than $3.2 million in free cash to those in the know over a two-week period.
Word quickly spread among gamblers, criminals and even homeless people that cash was being freely dispensed from the “ticket in and out” machines at Sydney’s Star casino, with 43 people taking advantage of the bonanza.
In total, the machines dispensed $3,219,420 in 13 days.
A software glitch occurred in machines that redeem barcoded tickets with gambling winnings as cash.
Players discovered that if they entered more than one ticket, they all got paid, but the machine only kept one receipt. The rest were spit out, allowing them to redeem them multiple times for their cash amount.
An investigation has uncovered how a malfunction caused four ATMs at Sydney’s The Star casino to dispense free cash.
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The lure of free money even caused a recovering gaming addict to relapse.
Thanh Lan told him Sydney Morning Herald that she had spent eight months away from her destructive habit when a friend’s boyfriend showed her how the machines dispensed cash.
He spent the next 10 days milking the ATMs, visiting them 34 times to withdraw $57,265 and then spending all but $5,000 of the funds at the casino.
“I was in this trance,” he said.
‘I’m really upset with myself. All the work I had done with my psychologist went out the window.
On two occasions she fell asleep in front of the slot machines and the casino staff offered her a room at the casino hotel, which she accepted and paid for with money taken from the ATMs.
After the flaw was detected, the casino reported Le and others who had benefited from the money given to the police.
He was found guilty of a single charge of honestly obtaining property by deception and offered to repay the money.
ATMs were ‘bill-in and bill-withdraw’ machines that allowed punters to redeem their winnings.
“I understand it was my fault,” he said.
“I had taken it deceptively, but the machine was giving us money.”
Le’s lawyer, Natalija Nikolic of XD Law, argued that The Star could have stopped the problem by reconciling its fines and payments daily in accordance with anti-money laundering provisions.
“They run a system that seems to pay little attention to the licensing standard expected of them,” Nikolic said.
‘They were giving away $3 million and didn’t even realize it: a system so obviously lax that it is a lure for money launderers. In our opinion, the worst violation in this entire scenario could fall on Star for these negligent violations.’
One of those accused of obtaining money by deception, Troy Manning, is in prison awaiting trial on charges of fraud, participation in a criminal group and knowingly handling the proceeds of crime.
The Star’s special manager Nick Weeks told this week’s show According to the NSW Independent Casino Commission investigation, the failure to detect the ATM failure was “a very significant failure across a large number of people and equipment”.
It revealed that the ATMs were faulty for six weeks, but it was only during the last fortnight that the players discovered this.
The investigation also learned that The Star’s head of investor relations, Giovanni Rizzo, allegedly asked the chief financial officer to hide the loss when she presented half-year results in February, but she refused to cook the books.
The ATMs were faulty for six weeks, but players only discovered the fault for two weeks before the casino also became aware.
Troy Stolz, former ClubsNSW anti-money laundering compliance manager, who was an expert witness, said venues operating “ticket entry and exit” machines needed to closely monitor how they were used.
‘This also raises questions about the robustness/effectiveness of Star Casino’s AML/CTF system. [anti-money laundering/counterterrorism financing] program,” he stated in a letter addressed to the presiding judge.
Star declined to comment on the matter, saying it would be inappropriate to do so as it was before the courts.