The Attorney General of British Columbia Dabid Eby revealed that terms of reference are being currently discussed, with the second phase of the province’s campaign against money laundering.
The first phase of the campaign was unveiled last week, after the report of the former Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) deputy commissioner Peter German which was aimed at bringing more light to the alleged cases of money laundering in the local gambling sector. Now, the second stage of the British Columbia’s campaign against such illegal actions is to be focused on monetary transactions associated to the housing market, with Attorney General Eby having said that he would work in collaboration with Carole James, the local Finance Minister, to identify the problems.
Mr. German, who has carried out an independent investigation on the matter before issuing the report, explained that an examination of money laundering within the real estate industry must deal with some problems associated to development, mortgages, the sale of commercial and residential properties, etc. In addition, Mr. German revealed that he would make another report but the investigation has just started and failed to provide any timeframe for completion.
German’s Report Makes 48 Recommendations in Terms of BC Money Laundering
As Casino Reports revealed last week, the first phase of the anti-money laundering campaign in the province of British Columbia was finalized with the release of the 247-page report of Mr. German. The report, which brought some blatant cases of money laundering in Metro Vancouver casinos, makes 48 recommendations and calls for stricter rules to be imposed to the local gambling industry to prevent such cases from happening again.
Some recommendations are related to the establishment of an independent regulatory body set to oversee the casino industry in British Columbia, as well as the creating of a specialized police force aimed at fighting money laundering in the province.
As revealed by Mr. German in his report, an amount of no less than CA$100 million has been “washed” through casino gambling services in British Columbia. He, however, has revealed that the total amount of the money laundered could be much higher, despite the fact that he is not able to provide an exact estimate without a forensic inspection.
Furthermore, the former British Columbia Attorney General Michelle Eliot spoke of the money laundering trend in an interview with CBC’s Early Edition, calling the registered cases “an unintentional failure” of local authorities. Ms. Eliot blamed the poor coordination between the different regulatory bodies in the province for the problem. She explained that the RCMP had investigated outside of the BC casinos, but the investigation inside the casinos had been delayed.
Ms. Eliot further explained that it was around 2016 when the problem was identified and actual measures were taken. According to her, the RCMP had been spending many its resources to investigate illegal gaming cases in the province, with some very important revelations made, eventually.
