MassGaming sets an April 2 adjudicatory hearing on Wynn Resorts’ suitability to hold a gaming license in Massachusetts
The Massachusetts Gaming Commission will hold a public hearing on the suitability of Wynn Resorts to operate a casino resort in the Greater Boston area next week. The gambling regulator will hear from company executives and other witnesses to weigh all the evidence collected and make its decision.
The first day of the hearing is slated for Tuesday, April 2, at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center. Commission members expect it to take up to three days to hear all witnesses.
MassGaming is finally able to hold a public hearing on the matter after it received earlier this month a report on a nearly year-long probe into multiple sexual misconduct allegations leveled against casino mogul Steve Wynn. The probe was conducted by the Gaming Commission’s in-house investigative team and aimed to discover how Wynn Resorts, the holder of a gaming license for a glitzy resort near Boston, addressed the allegations.
Investigators also looked for evidence if the casino company had knowledge of a number of sexual misconduct incidents reported by former and current Wynn Resorts employees and if it participated in settling those incidents through private settlements.
Massachusetts’ five-member gaming board was expected to hold its hearing much earlier, but was prevented to do so as Mr. Wynn sued the regulator and Wynn Resorts, the company he founded but left last February after the allegations against him surface. In a lawsuit filed with a Nevada court, the embattled businessman claimed that Wynn Resorts communicated to the Gaming Commission information that violated attorney-client privilege.
After several months of uncertainty, MassGaming’s members voted to settle the issue off the court floor in a bid to avoid protracted litigation.
Behind Closed Doors
Following next week’s hearing, the Massachusetts Gaming Commission will discuss the evidence it has gained and will make its decision behind closed doors. The gambling regulator has the authority to impose a hefty fine on Wynn Resorts or to even revoke its gaming license.
In Nevada, the state Gaming Commission fined the gaming and hospitality powerhouse $20 million for failing to investigate the sexual misconduct allegations in a timely manner. The fine was a record one for the state.
The Las Vegas casino giant has geared up preparations to launch the luxury $2.6 billion Encore Boston Harbor resort in the city of Everett near Boston at the end of June. The company has already begun holding job fairs to fill more than 5,000 job positions available at the property.
Commenting on the upcoming hearing and what follows next, MassGaming Executive Director Ed Bedrosian told the Boston Herald that the gaming regulator will deliberate privately to make a decision and that their decision will be released in the form of a written document. The gaming official did not commit to a certain time frame, saying that there are “complicated issues that require deliberations by the commission.”
In a company memo to the Boston Herald, Wynn Resorts has said that its executives plan to convince commissioners that the company has been transformed after the allegations against its former boss emerged and that they will make sure that “the inappropriate breakdown of controls experienced by the Company during the Steve Wynn era never happens again.”
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