21 Busted in Zhuhai Gambling Ring
Thursday October 31,2013 : ANOTHER BIG ONLINE GAMBLING BUST IN CHINA
Guangdong police detain 21 suspects in a special operation in the Zhuhai special economic zone bordering Macau.
Following the completion of investigations, police in Guangdong, China have released details of another online gambling ring shutdown, this time in the Zhuhai special economic zone bordering Macau last month.
The publication China.org reports that fifteen foreigners from Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore were among the 21 persons arrested in the operation, which broke up a well-established online gambling ring.
The foreigners are alleged to have been the organisers of the ring, said Zheng Zehui, director of the social security bureau with Guangdong provincial department of public security.
"The suspects established a gambling website, with a server in the Philippines, and used an online banking service to attract gamblers in the previous months," Zheng said on Wednesday at a news conference in Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong province.
More than 11.3 million yuan in gambling money deposited in a bank account owned by the gang was frozen, while computers, 130 bank cards of Bank of China, 16 foreign bank cards, and other equipment, were seized after the gang was broken up, Zheng said.
The gang also ran secret casinos in Zhuhai, he added.
The latest bust follows an operation in June this year in which Guangdong police in cooperation with their Hong Kong counterparts detained 23 suspects in Shenzhen. The gang illegally organised bets on horse racing, and accepted more than 900 million yuan in bets, officials said.
According to Zheng, online gambling, with servers outside the mainland, has become a new trend in Guangdong province, which borders Hong Kong and Macau.
"Police will spare no effort in fighting online gambling events in the following months, refusing to let the southern province become a haven for gamblers from home and abroad, Zheng said.
Zheng said Guangdong police have busted 395 land and online gambling gangs in 848 gambling cases in a special campaign from August to October this year. A total of 11,044 suspects have been detained while 86.86 million yuan in gambling money has been seized, Zheng revealed.
