- The commission approved the $7.2 million settlement 3-0, the sixth-highest fine ever assessed against a Nevada gaming company.
- Bowyer made 30 trips to the Venetian from 2019 to 2021, depositing about $22.3 million and losing at least $3.6 million.
- Current owner Apollo Global Management pays for conduct that occurred almost entirely under Las Vegas Sands’ ownership.
- Bowyer-related fines against MGM, Resorts World, Caesars and the Venetian now total $34 million across four operators.
LAS VEGAS – The Nevada Gaming Commission voted 3-0 on Aug. 20 to approve a $7.2 million Venetian fine settling a Gaming Control Board complaint that the casino let convicted illegal bookmaker Mathew Bowyer deposit roughly $22.3 million over 30 visits without ever substantiating where the money came from.
A Four-Count Complaint, And A Host Who Knew
The Control Board’s complaint, settled as Case No. 26-01 on the commission’s August agenda, ran four counts, centered on the casino’s failure to establish Bowyer’s source of funds and a casino host’s failure to report what he knew. The host knew Bowyer was an illegal bookmaker because Bowyer told him, according to the complaint, and the information never entered the property’s anti-money-laundering program. The Venetian did not ban Bowyer until March 2024, when it was presented with information about his bookmaking.
The settlement money is the smaller half of the penalty. The Venetian must review its anti-money-laundering program and hold or grow AML compliance staffing for at least two years.
Apollo Pays For The Sands Era
Nearly all of Bowyer’s play predates Apollo Global Management’s February 2022 purchase of the property. Only $88,000 of his $3.6 million in losses came after the sale, regulators said at the hearing. Commissioner Brian Krolicki aimed his frustration at the prior ownership, saying “I suspect the folks who I really want to have in front of me are not in front of me today,” according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
Two of the five commissioners recused themselves, including George Markantonis, who ran the Venetian during the violation years.
The license travels with the property, so the liability does too. That is the working rule the commission has now confirmed twice in the Bowyer cases: Resorts World’s $10.5 million and the Venetian’s $7.2 million both landed on owners cleaning up conduct their compliance departments inherited.
The Bowyer Ledger Closes At $34 Million
The Venetian settlement is the fourth tied to Bowyer’s play, after MGM Resorts ($8.5 million), Resorts World ($10.5 million) and Caesars Entertainment ($7.8 million), for a combined $34 million. Bowyer, whose clients included Shohei Ohtani’s former interpreter Ippei Mizuhara, served a federal sentence of 12 months and a day, was released in March, and was added to Nevada’s exclusion list in April.
Nevada revised its AML regulations the same month, and the state’s licensed Nevada online casinos framework remains poker-only, leaving the retail floors where Bowyer played as the enforcement front line for gambling sites in the USA. With the Venetian order entered, the commission’s Bowyer docket is clear, and the next test of the April AML revisions will come with the Control Board’s next complaint.