Lawyers for Alvin Chau, former head of Macau’s failed Suncity Group, has filed an appeal of his 18-year prison sentence. The sentence was handed down in January after a months-long trial of Chau and his co-defendants, including Suncity IT manager Ali Celestino, who has also appealed his conviction and sentencing of 15 years.
According to Inside Asian Gaming, Chau faced 104 counts of illegal gambling, 57 counts of fraud and one count of running a criminal organization. He was acquitted of money laundering charges and more than 130 counts of illegal gambling in licensed gaming venues.
The demise of Suncity and the subsequent closure of the Tak Chun Group on similar charges were viewed as the death knell of VIP junkets in Macau (The trial of Tak Chun boss Levo Chan is ongoing). Some junkets will continue to operate under new restrictions, but the once-dominant sector is not the powerhouse it was, and operators are looking to premium mass and mass gaming to take up the slack.
In a civil claim, Chau, Celestino and other executives of the erstwhile junket were ordered to pay a combined HK$6.5 billion (US$831 million) in damages to the Macau government. They must also compensate five of the city’s six concessionaires, who claimed monetary damages due to illegally diverted revenues: Wynn Macau, Galaxy Entertainment Group, MGM China, Sands China and SJM Resorts.
