LAS VEGAS (AP) – Billionaire Sheldon Adelson’s casino company is paying almost $7 million to U.S. authorities to end a more than five-year corrupt practices investigation of the firm’s former relationship with a consultant in Macao and China, company and federal officials said Thursday.
With the agreement, Las Vegas Sands Corp. resolved twin probes of more than $60 million paid to an unnamed agent retained in 2006 to acquire a Chinese basketball team, plus other business dealings that include a Beijing real estate deal to promote casinos on the Cotai Strip of Macao, U.S. Justice Department and FBI officials said.
The $6.96 million criminal penalty was in addition to a $9 million civil payment the company made in April to settle a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission investigation that found some payments to the consultant weren’t properly authorized or documented, the government said.
The company wasn’t charged with a crime and did not admit guilt in either case.
Sands spokesman Ron Reese characterized the payment announced Thursday as a monetary penalty, and said the non-prosecution agreement made no criminal finding.