Detection and Prevention of Casino-related Crimes

12 Mr Murali Pillai asked the Minister for Home Affairs (a) what is the Ministry's assessment of the casino-related crime situation in Singapore since the casinos commenced operations in 2010; and (b) what steps are taken to ensure that casino-related crime in Singapore will be kept in check.

The Second Minister for Home Affairs (Mrs Josephine Teo) (for the Minister for Home Affairs): Mr Speaker, the casino-related crime situation in Singapore is under control and has continued to improve since the casinos commenced operations. Between 2010 and 2018, the annual number of casino crimes fell by 58%, from 299 to 126 cases.

Police and Casino Regulatory Authority (CRA) actively manage the law-and-order concerns relating to the casinos. To prevent infiltration of criminal elements into the casinos, CRA licenses casino employees and subjects them to stringent checks. Police exchange information with their counterparts in other countries on the latest casino-related crime trends and persons of interest.

MHA has put in place tough penalties for casino-related crimes and Police adopt a zero tolerance approach towards such crimes. Police and CRA also work closely with the casino operators to deter crime through regular surveillance and patrols.

Mr Murali Pillai (Bukit Batok): Mr Speaker, I thank the hon Minister for her comprehensive answer to my question. I have a few supplementary questions. Firstly, in relation to the crime, how much of it are committed by organised crime syndicates? Secondly, given that the casino businesses are doing relatively well, should we not accept that casinos businesses will continue to be targets for organised crimes syndicates? And, what can we do to deter these syndicates, particularly the foreign crime syndicates from coming over to Singapore, and ensnaring Singaporeans as well?

Mrs Josephine Teo: Mr Speaker, I appreciate the Member's concern and he has a particular worry that organised crimes, especially by foreign syndicates, will enter Singapore through casinos. If we look at the pattern of all the offences, the cases that I talked about, the vast majority of crimes committed in the casinos are mostly opportunistic and petty in nature. And actually, the number that relates to organised crime groups – very few.

Among all the offences, theft and cheating account for the most. For the theft-related cases, they mostly involved theft of gambling chips belonging to other patrons at the game tables. So, this is not quite the behaviour of organised crime syndicates. Other common scenarios include theft of cash, valuables, unattended bags and wallets from patrons. So, there is a pattern and these types of theft offences are not representative of organised crimes.

The cheating-related cases usually involve the past posting of bets. In other words, the outcome of the game is revealed and some of the patrons decide to try their luck, in case the croupier was not paying attention. They would place a bet on a location which would suggest that they won but in fact they did not. So, such cases also are one of the more common ones. There have also been cases where counterfeit chips were used by patrons.

So, that gives us a sense. Since 2010, ever since we started the tracking when the operations commenced, there have been fewer than 20 in total that are related to syndicates. If you look at the amounts of money involved, they were between $14,000 to $1.3 million. But the Member's concerns are very well noted. We will continue to keep a close eye.

In this instance, the operators obviously have an interest. They have fiduciary interest and so they are minded to work with the Police to stamp out the possible infiltration of organised crime.