Las Vegas Sands paying $7M to settle corrupt practices probe
Published 10:13 am Friday, January 20, 2017
LAS VEGAS — Billionaire Sheldon Adelson’s casino company is paying almost $7 million to U.S. authorities to end a more than five-year corrupt practices investigation of the firm’s former relationship with a consultant in Macao and China, company and federal officials said Thursday.
With the agreement, Las Vegas Sands Corp. resolved twin probes of more than $60 million paid to an unnamed agent retained in 2006 to acquire a Chinese basketball team, plus other business dealings that include a Beijing real estate deal to promote casinos on the Cotai Strip of Macao, U.S. Justice Department and FBI officials said.
The $6.96 million penalty was in addition to a $9 million civil payment the company made in April to settle a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission investigation that found some payments to the consultant weren’t properly authorized or documented, the government said.
The company wasn’t charged with a crime and did not admit guilt in either case.
Sands spokesman Ron Reese characterized the payment announced Thursday as a monetary penalty, and said the non-prosecution agreement made no criminal finding.
“The company is pleased that its cooperation and long-term commitment to compliance were recognized in reaching this resolution,” he said, and that “all inquiries related to these issues have now been completely resolved.”
The government said none of the people whose conduct was described in the agreement work for Sands any longer. It also credited the company with undertaking extensive remedial measures.
But it offered a scathing summary of alleged wrongdoing in a statement about Thursday’s settlement.