BAD NEWS FOR GROSVENOR CASINOS

21 March 2008

Land gaming group loses £7 million court claim


Grosvenor Casinos has lost its court case against a high rolling Arab client who racked up £7 million in bounced cheques (see previous InfoPowa report)

The gambling group, which owns the Clermont Club, took the National Bank of Abu Dhabi to court to recover monies owed by high roller Ahmed al-Reyaysa, a regular on London’s gambling circuit who is said to have gambled £99 million in 18 months, The Times reports.

But this week the courts found that the bank was not liable for debts to Grosvenor Casinos.

Al-Reyaysa wrote two cheques for £3.07 million and £3.6 million from his NBAD account to buy betting chips at the Clermont Club, an exclusive casino in London's Berkeley Square, between December 1999 and February 2000. He lost the money playing roulette and the cheques later bounced.

Grosvenor initially sued Al-Reyaysa himself and won a repayment order against him, but could not enforce it as he is now beyond the jurisdiction of British courts in the United Arab Emirates.

The casino then sued NBAD, claiming that it only cashed Al-Reyaysa’s cheque after an NBAD employee had told Grosvenor's bank, NatWest, in a telephone call that it would honour the cheque. Grosvenor argued that NBAD had acted fraudulently and was therefore liable for the debt.

But a judge at the High Court in London this week dismissed Grosvenor’s claim, saying that the telephone conversation between NBAD and NatWest resulted in a “confusion or misunderstanding rather than dishonesty”.
In a written judgement, Mr Justice Flaux said: “It seems to me inherently improbable that [the NBAD employee] was lying . . . it is much more likely that he meant something slightly different from what [the NatWest employee] meant and understood.”

A second claim, that NBAD was liable for the debt under international banking standards, was also rejected. Grosvenor had argued that even though there was no written contract there was an implied obligation under banking regulations to honour the debt. The judge disagreed.

Jonathan Kelly of law firm Simmons & Simmons, acting for NBAD, said: “This is an important result for international banking practice. Grosvenor’s claim that a contract existed between NBAD and the casino would have left banks vulnerable to unintended contractual exposure to a range of third parties.”

Online Casino News courtesy of InfoPowa