Former BC Liberal government accused of ignoring money laundering evidence
Posted October 30, 2017 7:05 pm.
Last Updated October 30, 2017 7:12 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VICTORIA (NEWS 1130) – As BC’s new government reviews allegations of money laundering at Richmond’s River Rock casino, members of the former Liberal government are being accused of letting it go un-checked.
Debate in the Legislature on Monday focused on whether the Liberals ignored evidence of criminal activity.
Longtime New Democrat and Nanaimo MLA Leonard Krog says a report recently made public by his government was deliberately kept secret by the Liberals last year.
“The fact is there was trouble in our system. People knew it and they didn’t do as much as they could have if they did much at all.”
Former Solicitor General Mike Morris, also a former Mountie, is suggesting the report may have been kept quiet to ensure an ongoing police investigation wasn’t compromised.
“The members have to be very cautious and very careful on what kind of information that they put out there, it could have a dire effect on the consequences of what could literally be a multi-million dollar investigation.”
“There’s a lot of speculation taking place right now as a result of the horrendous things that the members in government are saying right now that could actually jeopardize the prosecution of that particular case if and when it ever gets to that particular stage.”
Krog, who’s also a lawyer, says that doesn’t explain why BC’s illegal gambling task force was shut down by the Liberals in 2009.
“You’d have to be a turnip just rolled off the back of the truck if you live in a community that has a casino where the public wasn’t raising these issues and there seemed to be a fairly lax regime dealing with what most people understood was happening in their own communities.”
The new NDP government recently ordered an independent review to investigate possible money laundering at River Rock dating back more than two years. The allegations involve someone at River Rock accepting more than $13 million worth of $20 bills from VIP foreign customers with possible ties to organized crime.
