Encore Boston Harbor was fined forty thousand dollars last week by the Massachusetts Gaming Commission (MGC) for inappropriately accepting bets on ACC football sports.
Due to illegal bets placed on Boston College women's basketball regular-season games in 2023, record-breaking fines were revealed on Monday.
One was the BC vs. University of North Carolina game on February 12; wagering was available for roughly four hours. Three wagers totaling $163 were placed during that period.
The other was BC against. University of Louisville on February 19. There was betting for two hours and thirteen minutes. There were four bets totaling fifty dollars wagered.
"In both cases, the commission said, the illegal bets were processed because an Encore vendor did not properly blacklist all BC women’s basketball team events,” the MGC said in the ruling.
The Massachusetts Gaming Commission (MGC) clarified the problem by stating that no collegiate sporting event featuring a team from within the state may be bet on by casinos in Massachusetts. That is, unless the squad is participating in an NCAA-hosted collegiate tournament.
Like many other jurisdictions, Massachusetts banned bets on the majority of games featuring colleges and universities in the state when sports betting was authorized there in 2022.
The campus of Boston College is situated outside of Boston in Newton, Massachusetts.
Lack of Safety Measures
Encore Boston Harbor had committed a second offense with these infractions.
"Despite identifying the first noncompliance incident, Encore failed to resolve the underlying issue or put adequate guardrails in place, resulting in its immediate repetition,” the MGC said in the statement.
Furthermore, the MGC stated that Encore and its suppliers "were unprepared for the adjudicatory hearing, which featured conflict and misunderstanding from Encore, WynnBET, and [vendor] GAN."
The MGC continued, "The Everett, Mass. casino has not demonstrated that it has "its vendors under control."
Sledgehammer removal
Encore's "solution to the noncompliance incident was to remove women's collegiate basketball entirely from its offerings," the MGC further said. In the ruling, the MGC stated that "such a fix, by sledgehammer rather than scalpel, is not an ideal solution."
"Operators should work to identify issues and fix them in a nuanced manner, that reflects a full understanding of the issue in question,” according to the MGC.
The MGC held a hearing last April 14 about the incidents.