Federal officials used a recent conference in Las Vegas to renew its commitment to a strong effort in the fight against use of casinos or financial institutions for money laundering.
Representatives of the U.S. Department of Justice and its Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) spoke at the National AML Conference, held at the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas in late August.
“Make no mistake, the Department Of Justice will pursue criminal charges and penalties against any financial institution including casinos and card clubs that willfully violate the Bank Secrecy Act,” said Deborah Conner, principal deputy chief of the U.S. DOJ’s Asset Forfeiture Money Laundering Section, according to a report in the online World Casino News.
Connor advised attendees on ways to strengthen their anti-money laundering (AML) compliance programs, saying the conference was held to dispel myths related to the reporting of suspicious activities in the casino industry. “Identifying and understanding a customer’s source of funds is not simply a ‘best practice;’ it is a regulatory expectation,” Tom Ott, enforcement associate director for FinCEN, told the conference.
The National AML Conference was organized in partnership with independent casino and financial institution testing firm Dowling Advisory Group.
“At Dowling Advisory Group, we continue to work diligently with our customers and the industry to develop procedures that identify the source of funds,” Jim Dowling, managing director for Dowling Advisory Group, told World Casino News. “Identifying the source of funds is critical to keeping illicit funds out of casinos and ensuring our clients are not fined.”
