Wynn Resorts and Okada Must Freeze Their Legal Battle to Let the Feds Pursue Okada’s Alleged Casino Bribery

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Two casinos have been at each other’s throats, Wynn Resorts Ltd and those owned by Kazuo Okada; the owners used to be on good terms, but when Wynn donated $135 million in 2011 to the University of Macau Development Foundation, Okada was the only one to vote against the decision, and he has since insinuated that Wynn used the donation as a means to procure land in the Macau area. Though Wynn says the Nevada Gaming Control Board has found Okada’s claims unfounded, their legal battle persists – or at least it will: it is been put on hold for six months while U.S. prosecutors pursue a separate criminal investigation into Okada for possibly doing some bribing of his own, in building a $2 billion casino project in the Philippines.

Okada’s companies include the Japan’s Universal Entertainment Corp and Nevada-based Aruze USA Inc, and they are being pursued for violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act by making bribes in the Philippines. The feds are effectively shutting down the other case, and this at the allowance of Clark County District Judge Elizabeth Gonzalez, for six months in order to clear the air and focus on the primary legislation.

  

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“That doesn’t mean in five months and 15 days you come back and say, ‘Judge, we need another six months,’ because it ain’t happening,” said Gonzalez, according to Reuters.

Meanwhile, things are getting ugly with the Okada allegations. Former FBI director Louis Freeh had concluded Okada bribed Philippine gaming regulators, but Okada released a report by former Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Cheroff alleging Freeh’s allegation was “lopsided [and] lacks even the appearance of objectivity.” It seems Okada is good at making such insinuations to serve his purposes, but meanwhile the feds are stopping Okada from interfering with the investigations, saying that he could start “posing a real danger to the criminal investigation,” and that if he learned more about the probe it could have “a chilling effect on witnesses we have talked to.”