An affluent gambler who spent the staggering amount of £27 million in five days by playing roulette is taking a Mayfair casino to court.
Juste Puharic, a businessman from Croatia, claimed that he was promised by the Park Lane Club’s bosses to get paid if he played there. Mr Puharic further shared that he was allegedly refused the promised cash-back amount of almost £250,000 after he won.
The Croatian businessman managed to secure a winning of almost £1.5 million after spending £27 million at the roulette table of the exclusive Park Lane Club in the period from May 26th to May 30th, 2015. However, he has revealed that he only agreed to take the risk and spend millions at the casino after its bosses addressed him as a VIP player and the casino staff lured him into gambling with a lucrative cash-back offer on his stakes.
Mr Puharic said that he is entitled to get a 0.9% commission, or £243,518, on his gambling stakes at the casino that surpassed £27 million. However, Silverbond Enterprises Ltd that owns the casino club is rejecting these claims, insisting the venue does not owe any money to the Croatian businessman.
Casino’s Owners Claim They Never Wanted to Attract Puharic as Patron
A representative of Mr Puharic, Christopher Bamford, told London’s High Court that the Croatian businessman had been a regular customer at Mayfair casinos since 2002 but he was identified as a valuable player for Park Lane Club. Bamford also revealed that Mr Puharic was approached on the street by staff members of the casino, who wooed him over coffee and dinner, convincing him to play there with the promise that Park Lane Club would match or even beat the best offer he could get from any other Mayfair casino.
As claimed by the plaintiff, the club agreed to pay him a 0.9% commission on his gambling stakes, as it wanted to match a cash-back offer he was given by other casinos.
These claims, however, were denied by the owners of the Park Lane Club. Guy Olliff-Cooper, who spoke on behalf of the casino’s owners, said that the club might have said it would do its best to remain competitive to its rivals’ terms and therefore consider matching some offers of rival casinos but rejected the claims that a formal offer was made.
The owner’s lawyer further noted that the staff member who had a conversation with the Croatian businessmen in the street had not been very interested in attracting him as a club’s patron but had only been trying to be polite.
It seems that November would not be an easy month for Park Lane Club, as the UK Gambling Commission (UKGC) has only recently revoked the operating licence of the property. As Casino Guardian reported at the time, the country’s gambling watchdog decided to take the measure against the gambling company as it found the information regarding ownership changes’ financing insufficient. Reportedly, Silverbond Enterprises, which owns Park Lane Club, is planning to file an appeal of the regulatory body’s decision for licence revocation that is set to take effect on November 18th.
The Croatian businessman, on the other hand, entered the headlines in 2019 after becoming involved in a dispute over the ownership of some classic cars worth £5 million, which he claimed he owned but were taken from a Mayfair hotel. A court’s decision on his Park Lane Club’s lawsuit is set to be made at a later date.
- Author
Olivia Cole
