Woman earning $750 a week gambles $3.7M

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-04-07/vicki-stole-millions-and-put-it-in-st-marys-leagues-club-pokies/100042284

by wombatmobile • 5 years ago

41 53 5 years ago

abc.net.au

noodlesUK• 5 years ago

I don’t know what the solution is, but gambling (and particularly online gambling and video gambling) is a scourge on our society. I don’t think it should be outlawed, because adults should be free to make bad choices if they want to, but the level to which it is exploitive and harmful needs to be reduced.

Does anyone have any good answers here?

_carbyau_• 5 years ago

Well I don't. Generally I like education but education can only go so far.

How do you help the people without the wherewithal - for whatever reason - to understand their actions and the actions of those around them in the bigger picture, while still treating them as discerning adults? I am not sure you can...

wombatmobile4• 5 years ago

There are two parties in every gambling transaction.

What about the responsibility of the house to detect ordinary people gambling way over their means?

wombatmobile4• 5 years ago

The current configuration is a cluster:

Jail the addict.

Protect the profits.

Don’t compensate the victim of theft.

That’s a recipe for rinse and repeat ad nauseum.

polartx3• 5 years ago

I think everyone can agree that the employee is the #1 scumbag in this story. I think a 4 year sentence is woefully inadequate for someone who effectively stole her employers retirement years, years he cannot replace.

Some blame can be assigned the business owner. How can you go so many years without a 3rd party audid, or Some kind of second opinion to your finances? Though trust shouldn’t be so harshly criticized.

The casino is in a tough spot. If it returns any money, it sets a precedent that would turn its industry on its head. It’s also not necessarily fair to its investors, and it would be hard to unwind all the hires, raises, and investments that were made with the fraudulently gambled winnings.

It almost feels like a charity should be established and funded by the casino; a vehicle to right wrongs such as these, without admitting fault/setting a precedent. Heck the casino would even get tax write offs for the charitable donations

nonameiguess2• 5 years ago

I think it would set exactly the right precedent. Anyone else who receives stolen goods, whether knowingly or not, has to give it back, and might be found liable.

lupire2• 5 years ago

Make gambling losses refundable unless the bettor posts a bond in advance. Only allow one purchase of chips per day. This prevents bleeding people drip by drip, while still allowing gambling.

Mandate that all chips display actual cash value.

Require signed disclosures with big warnings about the risks and costs of gambling, every time chips are purchased, like required on mortgages.

Apply Accredited Investor rules to gambling.

Mandate warning labels like on cigarettes.

akudha3• 5 years ago

it’s also not necessarily fair to its investors

Maybe not fair. But they invested their money into a business whose business model is to rip off its customers. They could have invested in a thousand other businesses that actually produce something useful to the society, yet they chose to put their money into a business which removes clocks on its premises so people would stay longer and gamble more and lose more.

Casinos maybe legally good, but they are ethically/morally bad.

On a related note - I find it funny that I need to be an accredited investor to invest in a huge range of businesses, but I can just walk into a casino and gamble away all my money, even if I am a minimum wage earner. Never understood that part.

bjourne• 5 years ago

I think the casino is the #1 scumbag not the employee. The employee was a gambling addict and the casino willingly exploited her addiction:

Clerke is now in prison and none of her close relatives would talk to ABC Investigations for this story. The closest we can get to understanding her behaviour is through what was said in court, and through Hannah*, a gaming attendant who worked in the club back when Clerke was obsessively playing the poker machines there.
"She was quiet and pretty much kept to herself. But she was lovely. She would come in at night and would often leave at closing, at 4am," Hannah says.
"She was one of the big spenders. I was told [by a colleague] she was the number 1 gambler in the club."
The court heard that a forensic psychologist had found that Clerke suffered from fear and anxiety, and that she played the poker machines to help her cope with her distress.
As someone who suffered from low self-esteem, Clerke would have appreciated the VIP treatment and attention she received at St Marys Leagues club.
"Vicki was at the highest level in the rewards program which is called Pink Diamond," says Hannah. "That meant she got VIP service from a personal attendant, free soft drinks and coffee, meals from her rewards points. All those on the top rewards tier are made to feel special."

I used to work next to a company that ran an online gambling site. They were about ten employees, some developers, a few graphic designers and project managers. One of them revealed that almost all their profit came from a dozen whales. One girl who worked there was their chat moderator. Her job was to greet the whales in their virtual lobby, cheer for them when they won and "comfort" them when they lost.

Klinky• 5 years ago

When Madoff was uncovered and investigated, there were clawbacks from the "winners" of such schemes. The clubs here were the "winner" of a scam/fraud, and also were negligent in not cutting off an obvious problem gambler. This isn't the first time something like this has happened. I don't see why they shouldn't be subject to similar clawbacks.

Absolutely should not rely on them setting up a "charity".

tiew9Vii• 5 years ago

It’s interesting you use the word “casino”.

She wasn’t gambling in a casino. She was gambling in what is essentially a pub that has a large room filled with pokie machines.

This is common across Australia, pubs have dedicated rooms (so called vip rooms) filled with pokie machines as they bring in a lot of money for the owners. Pubs are ripping out dining/general social space and putting in Pokie rooms.

It’s cultural to go have a pint and a bet.

She’s absolutely responsible for stealing but Australia’s obsession with Pokie machines and amount of Pokie machines is also problematic encouraging problem gambling. Pokie machines provide no benefit to anyone except the owners.

Not being Australian born the gambling commercials on tv was also eye opening.

cozzyd2• 5 years ago

a 4 year sentence is woefully inadequate

yeah, she should get a sentence commensurate with financial-crisis-causing wall street bankers. oh wait...

GhostVII• 5 years ago

Maybe setup more saving vehicles similar to a 401k that let people put their money into savings before it hits their bank account.

Like what if you could have part of your paycheck automatically sent to an account that your landlord/bank pulls from for your housing, have some put in a savings account that you can only access after x years, some that you can only spend on groceries, etc. Then people who know they have a problem can ensure they don't spend money they need for other things on gambling.

tartoran7• 5 years ago

You’re underestimating the gambling addiction. They’ll pawn the house, they’d even sell parts of their bodies if they could. It’s a horrible affliction

aliyfarah• 5 years ago

This is not the first story I've heard of employees stealing millions from their long term employer to fund their gambling habit, in fact it is shockingly very common.

A solution is to have casinos track/report customer spending, if a customer is spending (and losing) very large sums of money (say over 50-100k), they should verify their income.

I help run a small money remittence business and we're legally required to verify the payslips/income of customers who send X amount per fortnight (I forgot the limit as it's been a while since I dealt with compliance) and we send the data to a government body. If a small business can verify income and see where the money is coming from I don't see why casinos can't do the same.

After I wrote this I realised this isn't actually feasible as people can just walk in to casinos without being identified (never been to one). Maybe this needs to change, maybe memberships should be required for entry into casinos, just like you would a gym. It's just crazy to me someone can swindle 3.7m without causing any alarms.

tartoran7• 5 years ago

Gambling is as much an addiction as are hard drugs and it has similar effects on the brain circuitry. Im not a fan of this ‘sport’ at all. I witnessed how a friend ruined his life and aged 20 years within the timespan of 6 or 7.

Akronymus• 5 years ago

I am not above working for basically any industry. But gambling is the one I can NOT work in, due to ethics concerns.

alpineidyll3• 5 years ago

Simple idea: make advertisement of gambling and betting venues illegal.

beiller• 5 years ago

Is there some sort of corporate insurance for this kind of thing?

Jermaine_Jabi• 5 years ago

You can get insurance for anything, but surely one of the requirements would be to know what is going on in your own books...

tartoran7• 5 years ago

Ouch, that is a horrible way to postpone retirement. It’s still hard to comprehend how that much money was stolen without any suspicion of any kind and over such a long period of time.

geenew• 5 years ago

I don't quite get how the loss could have such an effect. The article says

"She hid her theft by creating dummy bills for suppliers and paying the money directly into her account."

If I'm reading this correctly, fake bills were created and entered as expenses, which were then paid from the company bank account.

If so, wouldn't the losses have shown up on the income statement? That would mean that the owner had the same amount of money he thought he had, but less than he should have had.

Likely some details are missing from the article.

tartoran7• 5 years ago

If I understand correctly this went on for some years. I still find it hard to comprehend how it went undetected for so long. But it did happen so it’s clearly possible

boatmansloth• 5 years ago

I don't quite get how the loss could have such an effect.

The main damage to the business was the revealing of the fraud and driving away the people who were going to buy it.

Nobody is going to stick around for years waiting for court proceedings to finish up to complete a purchase of a small business - they’ll just find something else.

doggodaddo78• 5 years ago

Textbook embezzling.

SkipperCat• 5 years ago

A lot of small businesses do not create financial oversight practices. I see it where I work. We're so focused on our product that nobody takes care to watch the books.

No company, no matter how small, should only have one person manage the books.

plorntus• 5 years ago

KYC and Source of Wealth info is pretty common in the gambling industry. For example at the company I worked at when you hit 2k EUR (or equivilent) your account would be locked until you gave information as to where the money came from. It's an overhead for sure but it should be the cost of running a gambling business.

Gambling addiction is real and while it is the responsibility of the person not to defraud others to support their addiction the casino should have picked up on it. Just like you wouldn't expect a bar tender to continue serving someone who is practically on the floor passing out.

neolog• 5 years ago

Are there some common ways that people often get around those regulations?

andromeduck• 5 years ago

How so you not notice a 15k/month shortfall? Assuming it was stolen at a constant rate.

Woman earning $750 a week gambles $3.7M

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