Kota Kinabalu: The case where a 35-year old illegal immigrant woman was fined RM390,000 or 10 months' jail by the Magistrate's Court in Tawau, recently, for manning 39 illegal gambling slot machines while her boss escaped charges was based on the Common Gaming House Act."Under this Act, only the person taking care and present at the time of operation will be charged," State Commissioner of Police, Datuk Hamza Taib said.
"If the owner of the premises was also present at that time, he or she will also be charged," he said, adding that actions are taken based on evidence and statements.
"The boss was not present during the time of the operation.
How are we supposed to charge him (or her)?" he asked.
Women's groups said it appeared the police did not go after the real operator of the premises for reasons best known to themselves and, instead, made the woman who needed a job to feed her family the scapegoat.
They asked why police did not consider that it was illogical for an illegal immigrant woman to be viewed as the owner of the 39 gambling machines, let alone be able to rent the premises.
Meanwhile, Hamza said 167 raids were conducted on suspected illegal gambling premises throughout January - almost half the number conducted the whole of last year.
He said 438 premises were raided last year for illegal cyber operations compared to 231 premises in 2010.
"Total arrests made in 2011 were 281 compared to 385 people being detained the previous year," he said, adding that 2,145 illegal cyber machines were confiscated in 2011 while 1,368 were confiscated in 2010.
He said police from the D7 branch (gambling/vice/secret society) found 56 of the total premises raided last month to be carrying out illegal cyber activities.
Apart from the 56 people arrested for illegal cyber gambling, 70 were also detained for other kinds of gambling activities such as illegal 4D, cock fighting and pai kau.
"Police also confiscated a total of 148 illegal gambling machines such as modified computers," Hamza said after the monthly police gathering at the Sabah police headquarters in Kepayan here.
Also present were State Deputy Commissioner of Police SAC Datuk Tan Kok Liang and Criminal Investigation Department (CID) chief SAC Omar Mammah.
