Judge allows $37.5M Encore Casino fraud suit to proceed to trial
A Massachusetts judge is allowing a $37.5 million fraud claim to proceed to trial after denying Wynn Resorts’ motion for summary judgment on a claim that it lied to the landowner who sold it the land where Wynn’s Encore Boston Harbor Resort now sits.
The suit, filed by FBT Everett Realty, LLC, asserts that Wynn Resorts strong-armed it into reducing the agreed-upon sale price of $75 million to $35 million based on misrepresentations that state regulators told Wynn that paying a “casino premium” for the property would result in Wynn being found unsuitable to hold a Massachusetts casino license.
Howard Cooper, Christian Kiely, and Ian Pinta represent FBT Everett Realty.
In denying Wynn Resorts’ motion, the judge determined that sufficient evidence exists to support a finding at trial that Wynn misrepresented concerns raised by the Massachusetts Gaming Commission’s Investigations & Enforcement Bureau about the casino premium based on an investigation by regulators into alleged ties of a convicted felon to the landowner.
The evidence, according to the judge, indicates Wynn Resorts falsely told FBT that the Investigations & Enforcement Bureau demanded that the casino premium be eliminated, or Wynn Resorts would not receive the casino license.
“[T]here is a material dispute as to whether [the commission’s investigators] told Wynn that its license application would be imperiled if Wynn paid a casino-related premium to FBT,” the judge wrote. “The evidence would support findings that the [investigators] never said any such thing....”
FBT’s fraud and unfair trade practices claims against Wynn Resorts will proceed to trial at a date to-be determined.