Bodog Asia Office Raided; Conflicting Reports
According to various reports, Bodog Asia offices in the Philippines were raided on Thursday. CalvinAyre.com, a site headed by Bodog founder Calvin Ayre, reports that several employees are sequestered in a boardroom and police are asking for names and addresses.
PerformInsider.com reports that the raid was made based on political pressure from ��Gangster Governor�� Chavit Singson. The site also says that the police had a warrant that accused Bodog of offering gambling on a ��street level.��
Bodog doesn��t provide gaming in the Philippines.
The report by CalvinAyre.com suggests that the raid wasn��t led by Singson, but rather a group of former employees led by Swedish national Jan Robert Gustafsson.
Gustafsson is evidently under indictment for fraud and theft, and the site says, ��The timing is no coincidence as three more charges were laid today against Gustafsson, Sherwin Quiambao, Arleen Aldaba and Patrik Selin. The current charges stem from more findings in the ongoing forensic audit looking into the past dealings of Gustafsson et al. during their time with the Asian online gaming company.��
PocketFives adds that an ��informant�� told Philippine officials that Ayre, who was indicted in the United States in Feb. of 2012, has been ��organizing ��dummy�� corporations in the Philippines as a part of his ongoing efforts to relocate the base of his worldwide illegal gambling and money laundering operations.��
Bodog��s Manila office gave PocketFives the following statement:
��As you may have heard, Bodog Asia has been falsely accused of running a numbers game to residents of the Philippines (part of our license agreement is not to offer services to residents of the Philippines and, therefore, we do not). The local police are, however, obliged to follow up the accusation and we are, of course, fully cooperating with them to quickly clear up the situation. In the meantime, some of our services are, naturally, being disrupted as our staff help the police. We are confident this issue will be resolved quickly with minimum disruption to our customers and we thank you for your patience."
PokerNews will have more as the story develops.
Photo courtesy of Online Poker Canada
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