Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Mario Galea and the Malta Lotteries And Gaming Authortity: the lies and the corruption of this puppet online gambling licensing body
In my previous article, The worthless and ineffectual Malta LGA, I highlighted the blatant shortcomings and failures of the Malta Lotteries And Gaming Authority as a gambling regulator.
Since then, more interesting facts have come to light.
In the first place, Betchance, a deliquent sportsbook listed as "F" by top sportsbook watchdog site Sportsbook Review for reasons of total failure to honour payments to players, is now open again for business, after a lengthy period of effective closure.
During the period of closure, during which no player who reported funds non-payment was paid in full, Betchance remained fully listed by the LGA.
Now that they are again open, they remain fully listed by the LGA.
In addition, the following extraordinary occurance was recently reported at Bookmakers Review:
At Betchance it's business as normal, according to the LGA
While a couple of players received 30% of their balances after signing a contract with Betchance giving up their legal rights to obtain the full balance in the future, and just as feedback from players who are owed money by Wauwbet and can't receive an answer from the LGA starts to pile in, the chief executive of the Lotteries and Gaming Authority, Mario Galea, recently rumoured to be stepping down from his position, indirectly answered my question about why Betchance is still allowed to operate.
At the recent European iGaming Conference in Barcelona, Galea told some industry operators worried about news that several Maltese bookmakers were in financial distress, that stories on internet sites like Bookmakers Review are all lies and that at Betchance is business as normal, with payments to players being made correctly.
Furthermore, according to Galea, there is an international police investigation into players accused to have defrauded Betchance.
Then earlier this week, an employee of a popular Maltese bookmaker, who on my behalf tried to get an answer about why Betchance is still allowed to operate, was told by Mr Galea the same story about players being investigated for defrauding Betchance. Galea also invited this person to stick to what he knew if he wanted to last in the gambling industry.
At this point, I really suggest players to stay away from all Malta bookmakers rated less than 4.
Date published: 04 October 2008
So, to summarise these jaw-dropping remarks made by Mario Galea, the LGA CEO who until reasonably recently was owner of BellMed, a company which provides internet facilities to the sportsbooks "regulated" by the LGA and who, it is rumoured, is still involved with the company:
1) Betchance is paying players.
2) The players who claim to be owed are liars, against whom there is an international police investigation.
3) If anyone says anything against Betchance or any other Maltese sportsbook, they'd better watch out.
Examining these remarks in order:
1) Betchance is not paying players. Bill Dozer, head man at Sportsbookreview, has chronicled the events in his Betchance news updates, and at no point have more than sporadic payments been made. Betchance still appears to owe a minimum of $100,000 USD. This is not guesswork on the part of Bill Dozer, who researches and corroborates his information before going to press.
As such, Galea's comment that Betchance is "paying players" is an out-and-out lie, unless of course Galea means "paying a few select players they choose to pay and ignoring everyone else", in which case it contains more than a grain of truth.
2) The players are not "lying": see above comments. The facts of the individual cases have been investigated, corroborated and chronicled by a highly credible source. The circulation of a partial payment agreement (thirty percent) is a matter of public record. Why was Betchance offering to pay players thirty percent of balances if those balances don't actually exist or were "fraudulent"? Why did Betchance claim to be "working on the problem", with apparent new investors lined up, if the players were fraudulent and, as such, not owed, and there was no problem in the first place?
Again, Galea's comments are nothing more than lies. As to the "international police investigation", there is no corroboration of this from any source other than Galea's outburst, and I am quite certain it is fantasy.
3) Yes, I suspect that you had better watch your back if you badmouth Maltese sportsbooks in Malta - the Malta LGA may well have high contacts in low places. I'm sure this is not a fabrication on Galea's part. However, how is the Maltese situation, in reality?
Waubet, another holder of a full LGA Class 2 listing, was defunct as of last month. According to the message on the homepage, it will be paying fifty percent of player balances.
So, another Maltese sportsbook where half of players' funds are gone.
Bettingstar 24 was also defunct as of September, according to Bill Dozer's Bettingstar24 updates. This latest Malta casualty has now, however, been taken over and appears to be paying.
As such, the security of Maltese sportsbooks does not appear all that good at all, with two books folding in the space of a month and at least one other fully operational again whilst not paying players. As such, Galea's pugnacious and threatening attitude, with dark hints at the risk to people's livelihoods if they question the viability of Maltese operations, is almost certainly bourne out of the fear that these prognostications are correct.
I would have to disagree with Betmakers' Review about playing at a certain level of sportsbook. My advice: if you know the book from long experience and are confident with it, play there whether it's listed by Malta or not. If you do not, ignore ANY rating and do not patronise ANY bookmaker which is supported only by the Malta LGA and Mario Galea. It could be a very expensive mistake.
Scam sportsbook BetChance back in business
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Originally Posted by bigboydan
