The cooperation between AAMS and the Financial Police, both during the preliminary investigation and the searches by the Police in the gaming rooms, has made it possible to land a heavy blow on the activities of criminals in the gaming sector. Through a continuous exchange and analysis of the data supplied by the AAMS technicians, the Financial Police have actually been able to ascertain the presence of "cloned" newslot machines, i.e. devices with dual cards activated by remote control, able to transmit only partial results of the games played to the distributor who had connected them in the fist place. Thanks to this combined action, 53 machines have been impounded, revenues of about €1.3 million from illegal gaming have been identified, and legal proceedings have been started against 20 individuals. In this way, within the operation "Gold Mouse", it has been possible once again to take full advantage of the cooperation between the AAMS and the Financial Police, to continue in the future with more positive results in the fight against illegal gaming. It must be remembered that 300,000 newslot machines are in existence in the whole country (30,000 in the Lazio Region alone), and that the 2007 tax revenues for these AWPs alone amounted to €2.2 bn. Compared with the previous year, an increase of 16.3% has been recorded in the first four months of 2008, resulting from a corresponding reduction in "black market" betting, due to the actions taken against illegal activities and organised crime. On this subject we report here the interview recorded with Pietro Ferrara, AAMS Lazio Regional Office Director.

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