Two directors of live casino technology outfit Medialive Casino were among those arrested for illegal gambling operations in last week’s ‘Double Jack’ operation in Italy.
Last week, Italian police raided 30 different locations across multiple provinces in a crackdown on unauthorized online gambling services offered via computer terminals in various retail establishments.
Florence’s chief prosecutor claimed the operation had links to Malta-licensed Medialive Casino Ltd, which also provides live dealer casino technology to Italian-licensed online and land-based gaming operators. (The company announced just this week that it had inked a deal with Italy’s Gamenet Group to launch live casino games on Intralot.it.)
On Tuesday, the Times of Malta reported that two Medialive directors, Massimiliano Fullin and Fabio Veglianetti, were among the seven individuals arrested in last week’s police action. Prosecutors allege that the illegal gambling ran in parallel with Medialive’s legit operations.
The 24 venues found to be offering illegal gambling services “were controlled remotely through the servers in Malta and all the money exchanged ended up going through the Maltese servers in various bank accounts on the island.”
Medialive is licensed by the Malta Gaming Authority (MGA), and a spokesperson told the Times that “it is yet unclear whether there is a direct nexus between the MGA license and the accusations being made by the Italian authorities against this company, given [Medialive’s] global links with other gaming jurisdictions.”
The MGA spokesperson also claimed that the regulator had yet to be approached by Italian authorities regarding the matter. Yet the Florence prosecutor told Italian media last week that his office hadn’t received sufficient cooperation from Maltese authorities, which limited the scope of last week’s action to Italy alone.
MGA exec chairman Joseph Cuschieri also told Italian gaming affiliate Agipro that his group hadn’t heard from Italian authorities. Cuschieri added that Medialive’s MGA license “has not been suspended at this time and it would be premature to give a comment at this stage, as investigations are still ongoing.”
