ATLANTIC CITY – Five New York City residents are accused of Casino stealing more than $1.1 million from casinos here through a bogus-check scheme.
The suspects allegedly exchanged phony bank checks for gaming chips at five casinos between Aug. 26 and Aug. 28, said the Attorney General’s Office.
Three of the casinos — Borgata, Caesars and Ocean — each lost $284,000 to the scheme, the agency said in a statement Thursday. The Golden Nugget and Hard Rock casinos lost $134,000 apiece. Caesars is among five Atlantic City casinos that lost more than $1 million in a phony-check scheme, the Attorney General’s Office said Thursday. “The defendants were caught executing a sophisticated financial scheme spanning multiple casinos and over a million dollars in fraudulent checks,” Acting Attorney General Andrew Bruck alleged Thursday in announcing charges in the case.
The case involved 1,291 counterfeit chips, each with a face value of US$1,000, which were exchanged for cash at the Marina Bay Sands (MBS) casino between the evening of November 22 and the early hours of November 23, 2015.
As a result, MBS lost $1,291,000.
Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Asoka Markandu said the mastermind – Toh Hock Thiam, 55 – was only directly responsible for the 420 counterfeit chips.
However, he is still indirectly responsible for the total damage suffered by MBS.
DPP Ashoka added: “Since the counterfeit cash chips are all the same, it can be inferred that Toho was either involved in the manufacture and distribution of all the counterfeit cash chips or was associated with an unknown syndicate member who made and delivered them. The counterfeit will be cash chips to him and others involved in the scam.”
Court documents did not reveal where the chips were made.
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After a 14-day trial, District Judge Luke Tan last month found Toh guilty of 13 counts of conspiracy to exchange fake casino chips for cash at MBS.
The court heard 161 similar charges involving chips and considered an immigration offense during sentencing.
The counterfeit cash chips were of such high quality that they went undetected for a whole week until an alert cashier noticed a slight discoloration in one.
After further investigation, the casino confirmed that the chip does not have all the security features found in the genuine product.
These features are invisible to the naked eye and can only be detected by special equipment housed inside the MBS cashier.
According to the Casino Regulatory Authority, the counterfeit chips are of the “best quality” they have inspected to date.
Toh was directly responsible for recruiting two accomplices, Seow Piak Long, 65, and Chia Wei Tien, 48.
Seow helps Toh distribute chips and collect money, while Chia contributes by recruiting 16 runners.
Runners and Seow were rewarded with cash for their efforts.
Chia, on the other hand, was promised a percentage of the total amount of cash from runners he recruited.
Toh deposited a total of $335,400 in cash into his bank account on November 23, 2015, shortly after all the runners carried out the illegal mission.
Eight days later, when he realised the police were looking for him, he withdrew all the funds from the account and fled to Malaysia. None of the money was recovered.
Toh was arrested in Malaysia on December 31, 2015 with the help of the Malaysian police and the Macau Judicial Police. The next day, he was handed over to the Singapore police.
Of the 16 contestants, 13 have been dealt with in court, DPP Ashoka said. They were sentenced to 5 to 14 months in prison.
Three runners managed to escape detection and arrest warrants have been issued against them.
Chia was jailed for five years and Seow was jailed for one year for his involvement in the fraud.
Toh could be jailed for seven years and fined up to $150,000 for each count of conspiracy to trade counterfeit casino chips for cash.
