16 Thais busted running 10 illegal online gambling sites
16 web admins are in custody today after being arrested around the Buriram province today for allegedly operating 10 illegal online gambling websites. The group of Thai nationals are accused of renting a house where they secretly operated a string of websites where people could gamble online including sajoker123.com. Police received a number of complaints in March from neighbourhood residents that the rented house was actually an undercover office for running the 10 websites.
The online gambling websites were allegedly being run in five different venues spread across the Buriram province, police investigators report. Officers obtained a search warrant and then raided all the locations this morning. 16 people were present at the time of the raids and taken into custody. The website administrators allegedly confessed to the crimes and gave police further details into their setup. They had apparently taken 300,000 baht in investments in order to not only set up the gambling websites but also take a class on how to operate only gambling sites too.
The 16 people are currently being charged on several counts including arranging and advertising illegal activities as well as organizing online gambling sites without permission. Police seized a multitude of equipment and devices from the 5 secret offices, along with a small amount of illegal drugs. 31 mobile phones, 30 computer screens, 20 computers, 6 internet routers, 4 CCTV cameras, 2 tablets, and a laptop were collected along with 16 bankbooks and 10 ATM cards.
There is no information on how much money the group of 16 Thai people were able to take in by running these 10 illegal online gambling sites. Last month, police busted another illegal group of 12 people running gambling operations online from Bangkok and laundering money to Hong Kong. They seized 15 million baht in assets in that case. The group of Buriram web admins were taken to Nang Rong Police station and legal proceedings will continue from there.
SOURCE: The Pattaya News
