China’s Supreme People’s Court has again issued a directive urging courts nationwide to impose strict penalties on individuals involved in organizing cross-border gambling operations, particularly targeting violent crimes such as intentional killings linked to these activities.
The court’s emphasis on maintaining high pressure against gambling comes amid growing concerns about overseas casinos enticing Chinese citizens.
In a statement reported by China Daily, the Supreme People’s Court noted that “with economic and internet development, the problem of overseas casinos enticing Chinese citizens to engage in gambling has become increasingly prominent.”
To illustrate its commitment, the court disclosed six relevant cases, calling for intensified efforts from all levels of the judiciary to combat organized gambling crimes abroad.
The court detailed case involved a defendant identified as Wu, the ringleader of a gambling syndicate, who was sentenced to six years in prison for orchestrating illegal gambling activities in Macau, in an operation said to have had generated profits exceeding RMB300 million ($41.22 million) from domestic residents over an extended period.
Other members of the group received prison sentences ranging from 30 to 36 months. The court remarked that Wu deserved severe punishment due to the significant capital outflow his operations caused.
The Supreme Court also highlighted instances where criminals disguised gambling activities as tourism, urging the public to enhance their legal awareness regarding the serious implications of such offenses.
“Gambling not only results in financial losses and broken families, but also fosters other forms of violent crimes,” the court stated, citing a case from the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region.
In July last year, the country’s top court had issued a similar directive to courts across the country to continue imposing harsh penalties on people involved in cross-border gambling crimes, with a focus on organizers, ringleaders and repeat offenders.
At the time the court highlighted the growing issue of overseas casinos and online gambling groups targeting Chinese citizens, saying that such activities lead to significant outflows of domestic funds and give rise to various other offenses, including kidnapping, illegal detention, fraud, extortion and money laundering.
Recently, China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi called on Southeast Asian nations to take decisive measures against online gambling and telecom fraud.
This initiative highlights Beijing’s growing urgency to address the rising threats posed by telecom fraud and human trafficking in Southeast Asia, as it seeks to bolster coordination with the 10-nation ASEAN grouping, which includes Myanmar and Thailand, to combat cross-border crime effectively.
