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A new whistleblower has emerged, outlining Alex Pariente’s purported mismanagement of anti-money laundering and compliance measures at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic.
An individual with decades of experience in the casino gaming sector reached out to Casino.org after the Wednesday release of an article that emphasized alleged cash mismanagement by Pariente, such as permitting unpaid credit markers, at the Caribbean resort. The tipster provided Casino.org with an email from Aug. 5, 2020, where he alerted Hard Rock compliance teams in Florida about the executive’s lax handling of credit given to gamblers, noting that Pariente made dubious hires involving at least two junket representatives.
Kamer Alyanakyan, a Turkish national, was among the junket staffers and is said by the source to have connections to Pariente from the executive's time at Wynn Las Vegas. In the email to Hard Rock compliance, the whistleblower states that in June 2019, Alyanakyan brought three gamblers — two from his native country and one from Uruguay — to Punta Cana. The whistleblower informed Hard Rock compliance that Pariente permitted the junket representative to cash a check written to himself for over $1 million.
The funds were placed into Alyanakyan’s player account at Punta Cana, from which he subsequently funneled at least $150K to each of the three clients mentioned earlier. The whistleblower claimed that this breaches the Bank Secrecy Act and ought to have been reported to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) by the gaming venue’s cage and compliance directors, yet those reports were never made.
In the email, the informant noted that this was a clear case of money structuring and that Pariente permitted funds related to Alyanakyan to be managed in a “covert” manner. They also highlight that it was usual for Alyanakyan and those three players to display victories and seldom losses.
Authorized Questionable Transactions from Italian Gamblers
The other junket representative mentioned is Fabrizio Mauro, who the whistleblower claimed was in charge of bringing two Italian gamblers — Giovanni LoMaestro and Stefano Piras — to the Dominican casino hotel.
In the email, the source revealed that prior to visiting the gaming venue, LoMaestro transferred money through a bank account in Monaco, while Piras arrived with cash. The whistleblower indicated that another staff member cautioned Pariente that Piras lacked sufficient information to back his income assertions and accepting his deposit might trigger money structuring issues, yet the executive approved the transactions.
They noted Pariente’s compliance choices were inconsistent, making this the second source to level such claims against the executive.
In his present position as corporate senior vice president of casino and hotel operations at Hard Rock, Pariente authorizes almost all financial matters at Punta Cana, which encompasses cage operations, collections, credit line extensions, compliance, and marketing, as stated by the whistleblower.
Dark Card Blunders, Furniture Fumbles
A different source, who requested to remain unnamed, informed Casino.org that while employed at Hard Rock Punta Cana, they observed several instances of Pariente permitting, if not promoting, careless money-handling methods.
An example features Venezuelan citizen Samuel Sanchez, who on several occasions as reported, utilized his American Express Black Card to purchase chips for casino play. This breaches cardholder policy since American Express, Mastercard, and Visa forbid clients from directly acquiring chips at gaming locations.
At Hard Rock Punta Cana, Sanchez managed to obtain chips by withdrawing hundreds of thousands of dollars from his Black card through “purchases” at the hotel's front desk — an action the source claims Pariente knew about.
An American Express Black Card. A customer allegedly used the credit card to buy chips at Hard Rock Punta Cana, which is against cardholder rules. (Image: Yahoo Finance)
The source also detailed the story of “Roberto,” the owner of a furniture shop in Venezuela. He utilized his business as a facade to transfer funds to the Dominican gaming location, where the money was lent to gamblers connected to the businessman.
The ex-staffer informed Casino.org that Pariente knew about both plans and failed to take action to stop those occurrences from happening again. The former employee, who has also spent decades in the gaming industry, confirmed rumors that Pariente permits certain credit markers to remain unpaid. A decade prior, they reported that Hard Rock Punta Cana had $500K in unpaid markers, but that amount has now surged to "millions and millions of dollars" during the executive's tenure at the Dominican casino.
Doubtful Patrons Visited Punta Cana Casino
Like certain other gaming executives, Pariente is known for permitting players with dubious backgrounds to gamble at the casinos he manages. The whistleblower informed Hard Rock in Florida about that issue, emphasizing several instances of the executive permitting questionable customers from Latin America to gamble at Punta Cana.
These comprise Luis Alberto Peluso, who was dismissed from his position as head of Argentina’s lottery due to alleged criminal actions. The whistleblower claimed that Pariente permitted Peluso to retain $500K in the Punta Cana cage for six months since the Argentine was concerned it would be confiscated if wired to a bank in Argentina.
In 2017, Brazilian politician Omar Jose Abdel Aziz, who led an anti-corruption drive in his nation, lost over $1 million at Hard Rock Punta Cana but was unable to settle that credit bill because of issues with a Brazilian bank. The whistleblower claimed that Pariente’s aide, Silvia Mendez, tried to obtain that money through a dubious currency exchange in Uruguay. Another source noted that Mendez hails from Uruguay and probably possesses passports for both that nation and the Dominican Republic.
The whistleblower stated that Pariente intentionally permitted a $200K credit line to be granted to Mexican national Carlos Aniano Sosa Velasco, who reportedly had connections to Odebrecht—a construction firm at the center of Brazil's infamous Operation Car Wash corruption investigation. The source informed Hard Rock compliance that Velasco was often seen at Las Vegas casinos alongside Miguel Angel Osorio Chong. Chong previously served as Mexico's interior minister and was believed to have connections with the Zetas, a notorious narcotrafficking organization, while he was governor of Hidalgo state.
