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Title: $72 million Confiscated in an Operation Against Illegal Gambling in Vietnam

On October 18 the Vietnamese police arrested 12 suspects making up a gang engaged in "the crime of "organising gambling and participating in gambling" under Articles 322 and 321 of the Penal Code of Vietnam".

Who Was Arrested?

Among those arrested were the 3 heads of the gang named Nguyen Minh Thoi (43), Ngo Anh Khoa (38) and Vo Vu Lam (35). All currently residing in the province capital town of Ben Tre.

Photo credited by bocongan.gov.vn

9 more were regular members of the gang. And 60 more people from Ho Chi Minh City, Ben Tre and districts of Giong Trom, Chau Thanh and Mo Cay Nam are being investigated for having ties with it. If found guilty, they may face sentence from 3 months to 10 years in prison.

Confiscated Items

$72.1 million (1,800 billion in VND) in cash was confiscated by the law enforcers. Other seized assets also included jewellery and weapons. As well as laptops, smartphones and tablets used to run the illegal business.

The sum is expected to increase, as investigation continues to unravel the case, detaining more suspects and gaining access to the criminal bank accounts associated with the organisation.

Case Details

The suspects confessed that they took part in running a number of websites offering illegal gambling opportunities for Vietnamese citizens since the beginning of 2023, including

Sbobet.com — 1.038.000 monthly visitors in September 2024. 74.79% coming from Indonesia, 14% — from the US and 2.23% — from Vietnam.

Viva88 and its multiple mirrors — 6045 monthly visitors in September 2024 on the main website, all from Vietnam

SV388 and its mirrors — 25,228 monthly visitors in September 2024 on the main website, 92.77% from Vietnam.

Ibet — already disabled.

Explaining the Problem of Gambling in Vietnam

In Vietnam gambling is tightly regulated to the point that Vietnamese citizens have very few legal options to gamble within the country, being limited to state lottery and some forms of betting like horse and greyhound racing. The few casinos that exist mostly only allow foreigners to play. With an exception of the few like Phu Quoc casino working in experimental “trial mode” and accepting Vietnamese players until the end of 2024.

This causes people to turn to gambling outside of Vietnam or to online casinos and bookmakers. Thus stepping into the grey zone and allowing criminals to profit on them.

However, the situation may change soon, as Vietnamese gambling laws are slowly becoming more lenient. Thus it is possible that in a couple of years the Vietnamese players won’t need to turn to aforementioned gangs and their projects for playing, having legal options available instead.