Australia's Gold Coast in the Surfers Paradise region maintains its reputation as a hotbed for sports betting scams.
We can now confirm that four males have been arrested on the Gold Coast over an alleged $10 million betting fraud operation.
Police advise that the criminals were involved in a complex sports betting scheme, where bets were placed on all possible outcomes so a profit was made.
The bids were subsequently placed through the group's Gold Coast-based online betting agency (likely to be named and shamed in the near future).
It's alleged some money that punters gave the men to wager cannot be accounted for, something that got the criminals extra unwanted attention in the first place.
The four fraudsters were arrested today after a year-long police investigation sparked by a significant number of complaints by punters from across Australia.
The police named the investigation Operation Stopwatch.
The men have been conjointly charged with one count of fraud between November 2007 and February 2009 and are expected to face further charges including forgery and making false records.
They are due to face Southport Magistrates Court tomorrow.
Acting Detective Inspector Marc Hogan advised the arrests were an excellent outcome.
"The State Crime Operations Fraud and Corporate Crime Group assisted in this investigation and will continue to provide further specialised support," he said.
Media Man last year shed light on a number of sports betting cons originating from the Gold Coast and facilitated communications to the Australian High Tech Crime Centre, a division of the Australian Federal Police.
*The writer is the founder and director of Media Man, primarily a media, publicity and Internet portal development company who operate in a dozen different business sectors. http://www.mediamanint.com
*Media Man has acted in a publicity and online PR role for Australia's Betezy who are the backend sports betting technology that powers the Gold Coast Titan's NRL club.
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