Macau police arrest Stanley Ho's nephew over prostitution ring - SCMP

HONG KONG (Reuters) - Authorities have busted a prostitution syndicate in Macau, the world's biggest gambling hub, and arrested six people, including a nephew of gaming magnate Stanley Ho, media reported on Tuesday. Those arrested came from Hong Kong, Macau and mainland China. Ninety-six women from the mainland and Vietnam were also detained, Macau police said in a Jan 10 statement, but did not identify those arrested. Alan Ho, who is a senior executive at Hotel Lisboa and a nephew of SJM Holdings' chairman Stanley Ho, and five hotel staff were among those arrested, the South China Morning Post newspaper said. SJM officials were not immediately available to comment. A spokeswoman for Hotel Lisboa declined to comment, and a spokeswoman for the Macau Judiciary Police declined to identify those arrested. Authorities said the syndicate had run for more than a year, generating a profit of 400 million patacas ($50 million). Each woman had to pay a membership fee of 150,000 patacas and a monthly "protection fee" of 10,000 patacas. Gambling revenue in Macau, the only place in China where casino gambling is legal, fell 2.6 percent to 351.5 billion patacas ($44.1 billion) in 2014, its first annual decline since casinos were liberalized in 2001. Last month, Chinese President Xi Jinping urged Macau to hasten diversification away from its bread-and-butter casino industry, which has lost about $60 billion in market value over the last six months. ($1=7.9806 patacas) (Reporting by Donny Kwok; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)