SJM’s Alan Ho sentenced for prostitution, organised crime

Macau’s Court of Second Instance sentenced gaming tycoon Stanley Ho Hung Sun’s nephew, Alan Ho Yau Lun, to 8 years prison last week for running an organized criminal group at Macau’s Hotel Lisboa. He was also found guilty of 58 counts of exploitation of prostitution at the venue. During the arrest, it was discovered that he was a director of affiliates of Macau casino operator, SJM Holdings Ltd.

The decision taken by the Court of Second Instance last week resulted from an appeal filed by the Public Prosecutions Office of Macau.

At the time of arrest of Alan Ho, a senior executive of Hotel Lisboa had been sentenced to 13 years prison time in 2016 for one count of exploitation of prostitution at the hotel premises.

At that time the court had acquitted him of the crime of participating in or forming a “secret association or society” with the objective of exploitation of prostitution at Hotel Lisboa. Macau considers “secret association or society” to be a reference to association with Chinese criminal gangs known as triads. The hotel is owned by a firm founded by Stanley Ho, Sociedade de Turismo e Diversões de Macau SA (STDM).

Alan Ho, along with other senior executives of Hotel Lisboa, was part of the folks arrested in Jan 2015 on charges of letting prostitution-related gangs operate in the hotel. As per a statement released by the police, more than USD 50 million (MOP400 million) had been exchanged as fees.

The police had arrested 96 suspected prostitutes, ageing between 20 and 27, for prostitution in the 2015 raid. One belonged to Vietnam, while the rest were attributed to mainland China. It was alleged that the prostitutes were forced into paying an annual entrance fee to seek clients in the hotel’s public areas. The police added that they also had to pay a monthly protection fee.

The Court of Second Instance also increased the sentences of other 5 senior executives of the hotel involved in the case.

A former deputy manager of the hotel, Kelly Wang, was sentenced to a 6-year prison term by the court. Initially, she had been charged by the court to 29 months of prison, after it was established that she had used her position to command fees from prostitutes. Now, she has also been charged as a member of an organized criminal group.

As per a statement released by the city authorities at the time, this was the largest suspected case of prostitution in Macau since the city had been passed to China by the Portuguese administration in 1999.

STDM, the owner of Hotel Lisboa, controls close to 54.1% of Macau based gaming operator SJM Holdings. The Lisboa complex casino is managed by SJM Holdings.