A baccarat dealer and a security camera operator at NagaWorld in Cambodia have been arrested for allegedly colluding with unspecified players to cheat the Phnom Penh casino.
The Malaysian woman dealer and the local man were detained by the national police on a holding charge of breach of trust. They are being kept in custody while the case is passed to an investigating judge. Three other casino workers were arrested in connection with the police investigation and later released.
The police gave no details on the precise nature of the alleged fraud, how long it had been going on, nor confirmed whether the casino had lost money from it. But a Khmer-language newspaper said in an unconfirmed report that a player had pocketed USD1 million as a result of the scam.
If the figure is correct, it would be a sizeable hit for the casino. NagaWorld’s operator, Hong Kong-listed NagaCorp, is operating on much smaller volumes than Macau properties. NagaCorp reported net profit of USD21.1 million in the first half of this year.
“As a law-abiding corporate citizen and for public interest, NagaWorld has reported a cheating gaming case to the National Police of Cambodia,” was as far as Eric Chan, Managing Director for Sales and Marketing for NagaWorld, would go when responding to the news via e-mail.