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StumbleBellagio: Indicted billionaire owes $258,480 gambling debt
Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2009 | 7:04 p.m.
Billionaire R. Allen Stanford is escorted into a federal courthouse Monday, June 29, 2009, in Houston. Stanford was indicted on charges alleging he swindled investors out of $7 billion.
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One month before his financial empire was shut down by regulators, Texas billionaire Robert Allen Stanford was running up a quarter-million-dollar gambling debt in Las Vegas, a lawsuit filed by a casino shows.
The Bellagio resort on the Las Vegas Strip sued Stanford in Clark County District Court in Las Vegas on Tuesday, claiming he owes $258,480 in unpaid gambling markers.
Stanford was indicted in June in what the U.S. Justice Department called a $7 billion global investment scheme to defraud investors. He remained jailed in Texas on Tuesday awaiting trial and has not yet responded to the Bellagio lawsuit.
In February, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sued Stanford and shut down his company's financial operations.
The luxury Bellagio resort, owned by hotel-casino company MGM Mirage, said in its lawsuit that Stanford signed for 14 gambling markers between Jan. 15 and Jan. 22.
The check-like markers, known as credit instruments evidencing a gambling debt under Nevada law, were presented for payment to Mellon United Nat'l Bank in Miami on Feb. 19, the lawsuit said. That was two days after the SEC moved against Stanford.
The lawsuit says all 14 checks were returned unpaid and were marked SIGM (signature not like on file) or RTM (return to maker). The checks ranged in amount from $3,480 to $40,000.
"Defendant is indebted to plaintiff for a gaming debt evidenced by such credit instruments," the lawsuit says.
The suit listed the defendant as "Robert Stanford" aka Robert A. Stanford, Robert Allen Stanford, R. Allen Stanford and Allen A. Stanford.
A Jan. 14 credit application attached to the suit and signed by Stanford listed his occupation as the owner of Stanford Development in Houston. A copy of a driver's license attached to the suit listed an address for Stanford as Stanford Estate in Christiansted, U.S. Virgin Islands.
The suit seeks payment of the $258,480 plus interest at the rate of 18 percent per year and attorney's fees.
The Justice Department said in June that Stanford, 59, also chairman of Stanford Financial Group in Houston, three Stanford executives and the former chief executive officer of the Antiguan bank regulatory agency had been indicted on fraud and obstruction charges in the alleged fraud scheme.
The indictment alleged Stanford and his co-defendants schemed to defraud investors who purchased approximately $7 billion in certificates of deposit administered by Stanford International Bank Ltd. (SIBL), an offshore bank controlled by Stanford and located on the island of Antigua.
Stanford and his co-defendants allegedly misused and misappropriated most of those investor assets, including diverting more than $1.6 billion into undisclosed personal loans to Stanford, while misrepresenting to investors SIBL’s financial condition, its investment strategy and the extent of its regulatory oversight by Antiguan authorities, the Justice Department said.
The Bellagio markers have already caught the eye of the SEC, which in February froze Stanford's assets.
A report in the Houston Chronicle in May said that when the SEC filed its opposition to Stanford's request that at least $10 million of his funds be unfrozen to pay for his legal defense, the SEC included this note:
"The commission is investigating whether Stanford has violated the terms of the asset freeze after it was entered by writing a series of checks to the Bellagio Hotel & Casino in the aggregate amount of $258,480. All of these checks were dated February 19, 2009 (two days after entry of the asset freeze) (and) signed by Stanford.''
A Stanford criminal defense lawyer, Dick DeGuerin, told the Chronicle that the footnote's implication was incorrect. DeGuerin noted Stanford signed the markers in January, before the SEC froze his assets.
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Amazing--how DID this injustice squeak past the Bad Check Unit at the Clark County District Attorney's office? Imagine--a casino actually having to *pay* lawyers to collect a bill allegedly owed to it. Oh the humanity! One might think they were a multi-zillion dollar business being treated like a multi-zillion dollar business....
Next time get a co-signer! This guy not gonna have anything left to pay up with. Maybe you can let him go double or nothing until he wins and call it even.
Now that's funny
is he really a billionaire or just a highly successful thief?
I hope that the fool revealed in his credit application to the Bellagio off shore accounts that the Federal Government was not aware of...
Pay your marker you cheap ass!
The real important issue is what in the world are all the ladies going to do with one less billionaire out there to sugardaddy them? This man is a true scumbag and what he's done to his investors should keep him in prison forever. AND, all those investors had to have been smarter than to put everything in his and Madoff's funds. Now that's inexcusable, too.
The rich are the only ones they need credit and markers. Us common folk use cash!
neimsa1 Thanks George Bush for creating another self entitled Texas Republican thief. This Stanford sounds a lot like Bush's brother Neil the savings and loan scammer from Denver.
Yes, Neil is a crook too and now we have yet another Bush heading for the run to the White House .... JEB - our nation is doomed by these war mongers and war criminals and dummies
@ homer and fosimmons
Using the facts, one would see that Stanford moved to Antigua in 1985, and began his real estate ponzi scheme in 1993 after his father retired from the business. Damn, you George Bush!!! You should have foreseen you would become President in 2001. You should lobbied to have the legislature to rewrite all the jurisdictional laws regarding banking in other countries back in the early 1980's. Then, you could have stopped this guy once you came in office!!! I have no problem if you want to bash Bush, but please, please, please use logic relevance.
By your logic, this guy was created by Clinton because Stanford began stealing from his clients in 1993. Ya'll are some d-u-m dumb.
Secondly, tell me one war crime W broke? It's a talking point that made no sense when it begun and it makes less sense today. Even Obama has backed off now that he is privy to confidential information he was unaware of along the campaign trail.
Lastly, dummies? W and Jeb went to Yale and the Universtiy of Texas...very good schools. I can see you are using your edumacation to spew your vitrol and non sequitors on a las vegas sun website. Well done. I am sure your GED is still in a box in your parents basement.
P.S. Allen Stanford, as is Madoff (and Soros) is a democrat. Thanks for doing your research though. Before trying to make an illogical connection between one man and an entire party you may wnat to know the truth. See below.
http://www.politicsdaily.com/2009/02/18/...
stop using taxpayer money to go after these flakes. if some one owes me money is DA Rojerks going to get it for me? this is bad publicity too. what happened to the poor drunk guy?
you loan it , it is not a "check" and you get it back yourself mr casino industry.
@ mred
How do you know the casino industry is a Mr.? I suggest it is a Mrs. It always wants more of your money, no matter how broke you are. It wants lavish things all the time, and casinos have to keep up with the neighboring casinos by being filled with more riches.
The least of his problems.
we love it when some greedy sleazebag stiffs the greeedy sleazebag casinos
Getting a marker should be as hard as getting a mortgage these days...who's kidding who.Who's the sucker here? The hotel lost,hope they learned a lesson.He knew it was a matter of time before someone caught up with him...and they did. The hotel will get their money when ALL his assets are sold or taken over by the FEDERAL MARSHALS and auctioned. Cheers!!
Here's some advice for Stanford: float a debt offering to cover the $258K due, say, 2010 yielding 8.5% for your investors. When you can't pay next year, offer to exchange those notes for a 10% yield due 2013. Then, when you can't pay in 2013, offer to swap for a 12% yield due 2016. Etc., etc.
That's what MGM does when it can't settle its debts -- why can't you? Just defer, defer . . . .
Not only is this guy a swindler...he isn't a very good gambler either!
"The commission is investigating whether Stanford has violated the terms of the asset freeze after it was entered by writing a series of checks to the Bellagio Hotel & Casino in the aggregate amount of $258,480. All of these checks were dated February 19, 2009 (two days after entry of the asset freeze) (and) signed by Stanford.
A Stanford criminal defense lawyer, Dick DeGuerin, told the Chronicle that the footnote's implication was incorrect. DeGuerin noted Stanford signed the markers in January, before the SEC froze his assets."
Taht's the way the Bellagio does it - you sign BLANK markers with NO date, no bank account, nothing. The only thing filled in is the AMOUNT. Later, the Bellagio enters a date and picks one of your bank accounts you have supplied to them (or any bank account they think might be yours) and tries to cash the 'checks.'
This makes the markers not checks - but post dated instruments, or 'short term notes' - almost the exact argument that Terry Watanabe is making. When checks are 'post dated' (or in this case - NO dated :-) they cease to be checks but rather short term notes.
For whatever reason, the Bellagio in this instance chose to sue this high roller rather than turn the checks over to the D.A.'s office. Probably figured the guy is going away for a while anyway, and by the time the D.A. saw him in criminal court his assets would be long gone.
It seems that with other recent stories in addition to this one, The casinos should probably re-think the credit they are extending. It seems one who gambles a lot should have the resources to make a deposit with the casino, and draw down on it (or add winnings to it, assuming that ever happens). Of course it would have to involve a bank, so a bankruptcy by the casino wouldn't make them lose out. Then again, these fools seem to lose it pretty easily anyway.
let this guy also go for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, just the same way the casinos are doing it with their lenders. Why would he have to pay his debt to the casino if the casinos decide not to pay back their debt to their lenders? Or how about this? This Texas Man should perhaps offer to "convert" his old marker into a new "marker", taking over 10 cents on the dollar. Isn't it exactly the policy the casinos are doing it to reduce their debts?
From Switzerland
Seven days and $260K. Sweet!!!
Well finally the "house" lost.
@ Boris
He can't file chapter 11 because he is not a corporation, but he could file a chapter 13, where he would pay about 35 cents on the dollar or more.
Reagan21:
Individuals can file BK chapter 11 and attempt to reorganize their individual business issues. There is no requirement to be a corp for Chapter 11.
Whatever, chapt 11 or chapt 13, I assume the kind reader gets my message: The fat cats get away with all the bs they're doing to corporate money (Station Casino, Boyd, etc), but the private people are the ones that should pay their debt? I mean, let's square it out and set the rules evenly. I would definetely go for Chapt 999 and pay back 10 cents on the dollar in a new marker, payable by Dec 2019 the soonest, if at all. This would be a nice response to those corporations that follow this policy with bond money and officially get away with it.
Greetings from Switzerland
Who's the bigger swindler? Stanford or the casino?