Major news in Singapore: Self-imposed S’pore casino ban: No jail term for offenders

Top news in <The Straits Times> :  Self-imposed S’pore casino ban: No jail term for offenders

K. C. Vijayan, Asia News Network (The Straits Times), Singapore | Fri, 06/15/2012 10:46 AM

K. C. Vijayan, Asia News Network (The Straits Times), Singapore | Fri, 06/15/2012 10:46 AM

A renovation contractor who breached a self-imposed ban on going to the casinos has had his two-month prison sentence quashed.

Xu Zhao He was fined S$3,000 (US$2,343) instead, in a landmark ruling that aims to avoid excessive punishments for gamblers who are trying to seek help.

The High Court judgment makes it clear that people who fail to stick to self-exclusion orders will not face jail time.

However, those who breach bans that were imposed on them by the authorities will be dealt with more harshly.

Xu was with his wife outside the Resorts World Sentosa casino at about 2 a.m. some time in September last year.

After paying the S$100 entry fee, his spouse handed him her identity card for safekeeping while she went to the toilet.

As Xu waited outside the casino, he gave in to temptation. He tried to get in using his wife’s identity card, but was caught by a security guard.

The 41-year-old was sentenced to jail and fined S$800 after pleading guilty in a district court.

His lawyer Anthony Lim appealed against the prison term, pointing to five unreported cases last year where the offender was fined but not jailed.

He pointed out that Xu had applied for the self-exclusion order through his 20-year-old son as he feared he would be unable to resist the temptation to gamble.

On Thursday, Chief Justice Chan Sek Keong released his reasons for quashing the jail term.

He said people who applied for self-exclusion were trying to help themselves.

They should not be jailed if temptation gets the better of them, because this might deter others from taking out the orders.

Xu’s sentence was “wrong in principle, inappropriate and manifestly excessive having regard to the circumstances of the case”, he added.

The Chief Justice said exclusion orders taken out by individuals or their family members were different from those imposed by third parties such as the Casino Regulatory Authority of Singapore and Commissioner of Police.

They were a self-help remedy as decided by Parliament, he said, and the courts should be careful not to undermine this by imposing deterrent sentences.

CJ Chan pointed out that the Casino Control Act does not make breaching a self-exclusion order a criminal offence in itself.

He added that there were already measures in place to deal with those who do so.

Charging Xu with using his wife’s card was a way of criminalizing what he did, added CJ Chan.

However, “the substance of his offence is still essentially an attempt to breach a self-exclusion order”.

He warned that too harsh a punishment will only dissuade vulnerable people from applying for self-exclusion in the first place.

And others who have already taken out the order may choose to withdraw it, rather than risk a jail term.

On Thursday night, Xu told The Straits Times that he regretted trying to get into the casino.

“I applied for the exclusion order because I don’t want to lose money while gambling,” he said.

“I always lose, and I have never won money before. Once I lost about S$70,000 to S$80,000 in a casino, so I asked my son to apply for the exclusion order.”

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