The Star Entertainment Group has accepted the resignations of Harry Theodore, Greg Hawkins and Paula Martin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Australia.-\u00a0Star Entertainment Group continues to reshuffle its board <\/strong>amid the New South Wales regulator’s inquiry into its Sydney casino. It’s accepted the resignations of three more executives:\u00a0<\/strong>chief financial officer Harry Theodore<\/strong>, chief casino officer (NSW)\u00a0Greg Hawkins<\/strong> and chief legal and risk officer and company secretary Paula Martin<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Star Entertainment Group said all three will work with the executive chairman\u00a0to transition their responsibilities in an orderly manner.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the NSW inquiry, Hawkins<\/a>\u00a0had been questioned about an alleged scheme to pay less taxes by migrating players to its international refund programme. He denied the claims and said\u00a0the casino operator did not want the practice to happen collectively\u00a0because it damaged the venue\u2019s commercial standing as profits from local customers were often higher than those from rebate players.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Martin<\/a> also appeared at the inquiry. She admitted that she could have done more regarding money laundering at the Sydney casino. She also agreed\u00a0the company misled National Australia Bank<\/a>\u00a0about the use of China UnionPay cards at Star Entertainment venues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In late March,\u00a0Matt Bekier<\/a>\u00a0stepped down as managing director and CEO of\u00a0The Star Entertainment Group<\/strong>. Speaking to the inquiry last month, he said he was\u00a0disappointed by the Sydney casino\u2019s management<\/a>\u00a0and blamed the failure of the international VIP business on the venue\u2019s \u201csubculture\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The New South Wales inquiry has heard that a senior manager allegedly\u00a0transferred more than AU$13m in gaming funds from junkets\u00a0<\/strong>into his own account before \u201cdisappearing\u201d in 2020. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, Marcus Lim, another member of staff in the VIP area, was accused of receiving kickbacks and making corrupt payments. However, despite an investigation, Lim was allowed to remain on \u201cgardening leave\u201d for six months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Counsel assisting\u00a0Naomi Sharp SC<\/strong>, asked Bekier if the company had tried to get rid of Lim quietly to avoid making any disclosures of seriously inappropriate conduct of a senior manager at Star Entertainment group. Bekier denied the accusation but\u00a0admited that the VIP team was the most vulnerable\u00a0<\/strong>to exploitation due to its massive turnover. Bekier rejected suggestions that VIP team misconduct had been \u201cout of control\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sharp said: \u201cJust at the point in the business where the flow of money was at its highest, and where the [anti-money laundering] risks were the greatest, and where the integrity risks to the casino were the greatest, senior management completely dropped the ball \u2026 didn\u2019t it?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bekier replied: \u201cI wouldn\u2019t agree with the characterisation that we completely dropped the ball.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Star Entertainment Group has accepted the resignations of Harry Theodore, Greg Hawkins and Paula Martin.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":26456,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"The Star Entertainment Group has accepted the resignations of its Chief Financial Officer, Chief Casino Officer (NSW), and Chief Legal & Risk Officer amidst an ongoing New South Wales regulatory inquiry into its Sydney casino. The inquiry has uncovered allegations of tax evasion, money laundering failures, misleading banks, and misappropriation of funds by senior staff, leading to significant executive accountability issues.","focusai_entities":"Harry Theodore, Greg Hawkins, Paula Martin, The Star Entertainment Group, Matt Bekier, Marcus Lim, Naomi Sharp SC, National Australia Bank, China UnionPay","focusai_location":"Australia, New South Wales, Sydney","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (1.0), regulator (1.0), compliance_legal (1.0), operator_casino (0.9), payments_fraud_aml (1.0), investor_analyst (1.0), supplier_vendor (0.7), journalist_researcher (1.0)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"Star's Financial & Licensing Impact?","query":"What are the potential financial penalties and licensing implications for The Star Entertainment Group following the New South Wales inquiry's findings?"},{"label":"Operational Stability Post-Resignations?","query":"How will these executive resignations impact the ongoing operational stability and strategic direction of Star's New South Wales casino operations?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[16336,157,158],"tags":[23871],"class_list":["post-29629","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-australasia-news","category-business-news","category-slider-home","tag-the-star-entertainment-group"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29629"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29629\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29639,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29629\/revisions\/29639"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Star senior manager misappropriated gambling money, inquiry hears<\/h2>\n\n\n\n