According to ACIC, Cheng is a senior figure in the powerful Chinese organised crime gang, the 14K Triad. Cheng was investing in many of Chau and Suncity’s corporate subsidiaries via offshore companies. By 2017, according to official sources in state and federal agencies – who requested anonymity because they are not authorised to speak publicly – ACIC had drawn a direct line between Chau and a Hong Kong crime boss, Cheng Ting Kong. As organised crime detectives in Sydney and Melbourne uncovered similar examples, the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission began doing its own work. When federal detectives examined his financial dealings, they uncovered a $403,000 deposit into a gaming account at The Star Sydney. As Chau’s international gaming operation grew, though, so did the rumours that it involved dirty money.
- Phelan also revealed the federal government had last week appointed three new “examiners” to join its team of ACIC hearing room interrogators.
- By 2017, according to official sources in state and federal agencies – who requested anonymity because they are not authorised to speak publicly – ACIC had drawn a direct line between Chau and a Hong Kong crime boss, Cheng Ting Kong.
- Last week, the director of operations at Sun Stud, David Grant, described allegations that Chau part-owned Sun Stud as a “long bow”.
- Sources have confirmed that during this time, ACIC was able to develop an unprecedented overview of Suncity’s operations, including how it had helped suspected Chinese criminals move huge sums to and from Australia.
- The Triad leader reportedly encouraged a friend to bankroll Chau’s initial business venture, a “junket” enterprise focused on luring Chinese high rollers from the mainland to glittering casinos in Macau.
- For years, the Chinese Communist Party had allowed Chau to build his junket empire, even though it appeared to conflict with the party’s anti-gambling edicts.
The Sydney Morning Herald
Chau’s operation also gave him the ear of the Chinese Communist Party elite who didn’t mind a punt and who, Australian authorities suspected, may also have wanted to quietly move large amounts of money to Australia. He came up with schemes to provide them credit in Australia, while also arranging to collect the debts they incurred in Australian casinos. According to media reports, the 47-year-old got his break as a 20-something disciple of Macau organised crime boss Wan “Broken Tooth” Kuok-koi. The arrest of Chau in Australia was never deemed likely, but ACIC hoped to displace Chau’s multibillion-dollar operations from Sydney and Melbourne and make him vulnerable to arrest offshore.
Gaming watchdog urges Premier to call pokies money-laundering inquiry
Chau had even been appointed to a prestigious CCP committee, a seemingly quiet endorsement of his operations. For years, the Chinese Communist Party had allowed Chau to build his junket empire, even though it appeared to conflict with the party’s anti-gambling edicts. The public reporting of Chau’s activities in Australia at the NSW Bergin inquiry and at the Finkelstein royal commission in Victoria placed Chinese authorities in a bind. As it looked into Suncity operatives behind closed doors, ACIC also provided information about the company to the state commissions of online pokies inquiry into Crown Resorts that, along with media exposés, led to the overhaul of Crown and Australia’s gambling industry. “Coercive examinations are one of the tools we use to exert maximum pressure on all levels of the criminal enterprise,” he said.
The Macau-headquartered and Chau-owned “Suncity Gaming” had, according to intelligence briefings ACIC provided NSW and Victorian police, “significant capabilities to facilitate large-scale money laundering between Australia and China”. Over a year earlier, ACIC had added Chau’s junket business – the Suncity firm dealing with Crown and The Star and which was generating billions of dollars in high-roller turnover – to its Australian priority target list. It is not suggested that Brogan was personally involved in any wrongdoing or criminal activity, only that he is involved with Suncity.
Last week, the director of operations at Sun Stud, David Grant, described allegations that Chau part-owned Sun Stud as a “long bow”. In September, corporate filings reveal that Chau offloaded his last Sun Stud holding to Cheng via a British Virgin Islands company. Official sources not authorised to comment publicly say ACIC investigations into Cheng allege he is involved in “orchestrating large-scale money-laundering activity in Australia and the sourcing and distribution of heroin both in Hong Kong and overseas”.
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