A little over five months after opening its doors in the southern Brazilian city of Porto Alegre and the Winfil slots hall has reportedly been officially ordered to close following multiple police raids.
According to a Friday report from G3Newswire, the Paris-themed facility in the port city of some 1.48 million inhabitants debuted in October complete with 460 slots as well as a restaurant. But, the venue was raided by state police only eleven days after its premiere amid allegations that it was illegally offering players the ability to place real-money wagers.
G3Newswire reported that two similar raids subsequently followed with law enforcement officials seizing cash and machine components despite assertions from the facility that its actions were legal under the nation’s Constitution of 1988.
However, officials in the province of Rio Grande Do Sul, in which Porto Alegre is the capital and largest city, reportedly disagreed and last week permanently revoked the facility’s license after determining that it had committed criminal offenses that were now to be investigated by the Public Prosecutor’s Office.
G3Newswire reported that the ability to offer real-money slot wagers in Brazil remains something of a grey area as last year saw Rio Grande Do Sul magistrates rule that gambling does not violate the nation’s Criminal Contravention Act of 1941 due to this piece of legislation being subsequently invalidated by the civilian-written Constitution.
This has reportedly led to several slot halls reopening in the southern province despite there being no rules in place that expressly permit the facilities to offer real-money wagers. In response, Rio Grande Do Sul’s Public Prosecutor’s Office has purportedly appealed to the nation’s Supreme Federal Court with this eleven-member body now due to rule on whether gambling is an illegal activity.
G3Newswire reported that last month saw a lawyer working on behalf of the Winfil venue in Porto Alegre state that it intends to wait to see how new gambling legislation currently being formulated pans out before deciding whether to permanently close its doors.