According to ACIC, Cheng is a senior figure in the powerful Chinese organised crime gang, the 14K Triad. Cheng was investing in many of Chau and Suncity’s corporate subsidiaries via offshore companies. By 2017, according to official sources in state and federal agencies – who requested anonymity because they are not authorised to speak publicly – ACIC had drawn a direct line between Chau and a Hong Kong crime boss, Cheng Ting Kong. As organised crime detectives in Sydney and Melbourne uncovered similar examples, the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission began doing its own work. When federal detectives examined his financial dealings, they uncovered a $403,000 deposit into a gaming account at The Star Sydney. As Chau’s international gaming operation grew, though, so did the rumours that it involved dirty money.
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The Sydney Morning Herald
Chau had even been appointed to a prestigious CCP committee, a seemingly quiet endorsement of his operations. For years, the Chinese Communist Party had allowed Chau to build his junket empire, even though it appeared to conflict with the party’s anti-gambling edicts. The public reporting of Chau’s activities in Australia at the NSW Bergin inquiry and at the Finkelstein royal commission in Victoria placed Chinese authorities in a bind. As it looked into Suncity operatives behind closed doors, ACIC also provided information about the company to the state commissions of inquiry into Crown Resorts that, along with media exposés, led to the overhaul of Crown and Australia’s gambling industry. “Coercive examinations are one of the tools we use to exert maximum pressure on all levels of the criminal enterprise,” he said.
But the accountant, who retired from PwC in 1995 and is paid a yearly partners’ fee by the giant consulting firm, appears to have contracted PwC to provide Suncity a corporate address and tax services. In 2017, ACIC’s chief Phelan informed his board of police and spy chiefs that it had listed Cheng as an “Australian priority organisation target”, a designation reserved for those posing the greatest organised crime threat to Australia. Anti-money-laundering agency Austrac, which also has a representative on the ACIC board, warned last year in a heavily redacted report that high-roller operations were also suspected of funding foreign interference operations. It’s headed by a former senior federal police officer, Mike Phelan, and is guided by board members who include AFP Commissioner Reece Kershaw, ASIO Director-General Mike Burgess and the heads of state and territory policing agencies. ACIC exists to feed high-grade intelligence to state and federal agencies.
And on December 1, the Suncity high-roller travel business ceased its casino operations in Macau, the place where it all began. On November 28, Macau police remanded him in custody to face trial for alleged criminal association, illegal gambling, money laundering and running an illegal online gambling operation in the Philippines. Under Australian corporate law, international businesses need an Australian resident director to oversee their corporate and tax obligations, and Brogan appears to have fulfilled that role. By the late 2000s, almost every major Macau casino had a Suncity high-roller room where Chau’s clients could gamble huge amounts in luxury settings, away from the prying eyes of mainland authorities. The Triad leader reportedly encouraged a friend to bankroll Chau’s initial business venture, a “junket” enterprise focused on luring Chinese high rollers from the mainland to glittering casinos in Macau.
- By the late 2000s, almost every major Macau casino had a Suncity high-roller room where Chau’s clients could gamble huge amounts in luxury settings, away from the prying eyes of mainland authorities.
- It is not suggested that Brogan was personally involved in any wrongdoing or criminal activity, only that he is involved with Suncity.
- He conceded Cheng was still involved but insisted he was “squeaky clean”.
- ACIC exists to feed high-grade intelligence to state and federal agencies.
