26 ARRESTED IN MALAYSIAN ONLINE GAMBLING RAIDS
Tuesday June 26, 2012 : 26 ARRESTED IN MALAYSIAN ONLINE GAMBLING RAIDS
42 computers seized in three raids across Kuantan City
The current hot spot for Malaysian police raids on internet gambling premises appears to be Kuantan, capital of the nation’s third largest province.
In three raids Monday police reported arresting 26 suspects, aged between 20 and 40, including two women, and confiscating 42 computers.
Police Asst Supt Sampornak Ismail told reporters that many of those detained had been caught red-handed gambling or organising internet gambling activity, and they would face charges under the Common Gaming House Act 1953.
He warned that the raids would continue, and that the police would also liaise with local municipalities to have the water and electricity supply cut off to premises where persistent gambling activity took place.
The current raids were mounted as a result of public tip-offs, leading to several plain-clothes personnel pretending to be customers before moving in to nab the suspects.
Asst Supt Ismail told reporters that from January to the middle of June, a total of 147 raids had been conducted by the police operations and surveillance division which saw the arrests of 768 suspects and seizure of 1,566 computer sets.
In related news the South China Morning Press reports that Chinese police have broken a HK$10 million illegal bookkeeping ring specialising in bets on football and horse racing.
A suspect was being questioned Monday night as police searched for the mastermind and bookmakers in the syndicate. 33-year-old suspect Wo Shing Wo, a suspected triad member, was arrested during a raid on a flat.
Senior Inspector Stephen Cheng Ka-chun of New Territories South regional crime unit said it was believed the flat had been used as the syndicate's betting centre for nine months.
In the raid – the latest in a citywide anti-gambling operation mounted during the Euro 2012 football tournament – police also seized betting orders, three mobile phones, a computer and HK$53,000 in local and mainland currency.
The arrest followed an earlier raid Sunday in which officers from the Organised Crime and Triad Bureau broke up a money-laundering and illegal bookmaking racket that accepted HK$100 million a month in illegal bets on soccer matches and horse races.
Twelve people were arrested. and initial investigations indicate that the syndicate laundered more than HK$700 million in proceeds from illegal bookmaking activities in the past two years, according to police.
Since the Euro 2012 tournament began on June 8, police have arrested 24 people and seized HK$93 million in illegal bets on soccer matches and horse racing in five separate cases.
