Gambling 'whale' says US$110m casino debts are really loans

A Japanese-American gambler who lost more than US$110 million in Las Vegas casinos is waging a Nevada court battle, the outcome of which could affect Hong Kong legal judgments against such high-rollers.

Terrance 'Terry' Watanabe, who lost the money in casinos owned by Harrah's Entertainment, is asking a Las Vegas court to throw out charges that he defaulted on gambling debts. He alleges the casinos plied him with alcohol and prescription drugs to keep him intoxicated while playing.

He also claims that under the casinos' system for granting credit to high-rollers, his 'markers' were, in essence, loans and that he should be given greater leeway in paying them.

The Clark county district court has scheduled a hearing today to consider motions filed by the Nebraska philanthropist, who once ran a direct marketing business importing toys and novelty items from the mainland and Hong Kong. He is asking the court to dismiss a grand jury indictment against him for writing 38 bad cheques to pay gambling debts of US$14.7 million.

If successful, Mr Watanabe's move could prompt a rethink of the way that Las Vegas casinos have, for decades, enforced gambling debts via the courts. It is a system that has been recognised repeatedly over the years in Hong Kong legal judgments against local, Macau and mainland high-rollers.

By all accounts, Mr Watanabe, 52, was a 'whale', or a gambler of epic proportions. His lawyers estimate his play at Harrah's Caesars Palace and Rio casinos in Las Vegas accounted for around 20 per cent of revenue at both properties in 2006 and 2007.