B.C. lottery president says cash limits at casinos no panacea against illegal money

The president of the British Columbia Lottery Corp.says the former Liberal government called for tighter controls on
cash at casinos but didn't order the Crown corporation to imposebuy-in limits on gamblers as part of its overall anti-moneylaundering strategy.

Jim Lightbody said it wasn't until 2018, following a change ingovernment and in connection with a money laundering investigationreport by former deputy RCMP commissioner Peter German, that theCrown corporation placed restrictions on cash buy-ins at casinos of$10,000 or more.

"It was never directly stated to me that's what they wanted,''Lightbody said Friday, concluding two days of testimony at a publicinquiry into money laundering.

"I never heard that we should be following the prescriptiveapproach until Dr. German's first recommendation and that was thefirst time we moved to the prescriptive approach.''

The inquiry has heard testimony that up until at least 2015,people arrived at B.C. casinos with bags containing hundreds ofthousands of dollars in $20 bills.

German's report concluded organized crime groups used B.C.casinos to launder illegal cash obtained through drug sales andother illicit activities.

Lightbody, who is on medical leave from his duties as lotterycorporation president, said the former B.C. Liberal government,including then-finance minister Mike de Jong, sent letters and heldmeetings with him where the importance of cash thresholds wasdiscussed, but stopping large cash buy-ins at casinos was notordered.

He said the government in its annual mandate letters to himcontinued to support the corporation's risk-based approach toanti-money laundering, which included investigating and monitoringsuspicious people, requiring some gamblers to disclose their sourceof cash and banning others from casinos.

"It wasn't a tick-the-box, you've had two suspicioustransactions, you're out,'' said Lightbody. "There wasn't a panacea to an anti-money laundering regime.''

He said the pitfalls of applying a prescriptive approach toanti-money laundering is criminals will find a way around the
measure.

"It has to be very very fluid and thoughtful and a risk-basedapproach,'' he said.

Lightbody testified Thursday that the lottery corporation steppedup requirements for some players to disclose the source of theircash after receiving a 2015 police report that said organizedcriminals were using casinos for money laundering.

He said that was the first time police told the corporation therewas evidence of illegal cash linked to organized crime at casinos.

Last November, former gaming investigator Larry Vander Graaf, whois also a former RCMP officer, told the commission the lotterycorporation did not move quickly enough to protect the integrity ofgaming from organized crime more than a decade ago.

He said suspicious cash started to appear at casinos in 2007, andby 2010, loan sharks were circulating nearby parking lots with bagsof money believed to be from proceeds of crime.

The province appointed B.C. Supreme Court Justice Austin Cullenin 2019 to lead the public inquiry into money laundering after threereports outlined how hundreds of millions of dollars in illegal cashaffected the real estate, luxury vehicle and gaming sectors.