Crown inquiry: Melco allowed to keep documents secret

Melco will not have to turn over documents to inquiry into its involvement with Crown Resorts and James Packer.

Australia.- Melco Resorts has been allowed to keep legally privileged documents relating to the ongoing probe into its involvement with Crown and its founder James Packer secret from public inquiry. 

The documents relate to a probe, launched by the Independent Liquor and Gaming Authority, into Melco’s suitability for involvement in Crown’s Sydney Barangaroo project.

The same inquiry is also considering whether James Packer’s $1.8 billion sale of some of his Crown shares to Melco last year was in breach of Crown’s Sydney casino license due to Melco CEO Lawrence Ho’s ties to his father, Stanley Ho. 

The inquiry is said to have the same powers as that of a Royal Commission, including the ability to compel parties to produce documents and give evidence.

Melco took the regulator to the NSW Supreme Court last week to challenge its right to demand nine documents covered by legal privilege, and the court ruled in Melco’s favour on Tuesday.