Phuong Quoc Truong was the first ever player who actually brought in racketeering in an organized casino cheating operation where the owners of the casinos were not involved. He had been the head of the Tran Organization which was a group of Vietnamese criminals and other Caucasian casino workers. He had put together a team which had been the largest, most profitable and the longest ever casino cheating scam in the world of all time.
The Scandal
Phuong Quoc Troung had scammed dozens of casinos and had managed to cheat them for tens of millions of dollars in Canada as well as in the US. He had operated this scam for around six years from 2002 till 2007. It had been so pernicious since it had corrupted dozens of employees in the casinos in both of these countries and had even included the son of a Mayor in Seattle which showed just how easy it was to bribe and corrupt the casino employees.
When the casinos employees joined hands with organized and skilled cheats, a very serious internal security breach took place. Charges were brought against Truong and he pleaded guilty to several cheating charges and conspiracy.
The Charges
Troung had pleaded guilty to several charges and had admitted that he and his partners had obtained up to a total of $ 7 million during their activities but in reality, the figure is higher than that. Troung and a dealer would recruit and execute a false shuffle scheme at several casinos during the mini baccarat and blackjack games. Members of the organization also bribed the dealers, supervisors and the other casino members in order to perform the scam and then the members of the group would place a bet on the order of cards which was known to them.
By doing this, the members won each time thousands of dollars, somewhere around $868,000 in a single night. They also used various other sophisticated devices and mechanisms for tracking the order of the cards during the games which included special software and hidden transmitters which they used in blackjack and mini baccarat.
The casino cheating case was investigated by the San Diego Division of the FBI and by the Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation and by several other gambling control authorities. There were literally dozens of authorities who were involved in the investigation from several states throughout the US because of the size of the scam which was involved.
For nearly six years, Troung and his team operated without ever being noticed though they had managed to rip apart dozens of casinos all across the US and even in Canada. They had bribed the casino employees in huge numbers and had managed to build up a very huge team of players who in their scam managed to make millions of dollars in the process.
However, it was because of this large scaled operation that the scam went bust in the end and the details were revealed to the casinos and to the world.