Administrative Court Düsseldorf: prohibition notice against casino operators is revoked

With its judgement of the 10th. of May 2022 the Administrative Court Düsseldorf has immediately revoked two prohibition orders against casino operators. The gambling providers were previously forbidden from organising public gambling on the internet, as well as from advertising for gambling. But why were the prohibition orders revoked by the court after such a long time?

Only a few days ago we discussed in an article, that online casinos are defending themselves when being sued by the players. Now the Administrative Court in Düsseldorf has revoked, with immediate effect, two prohibition orders against gambling providers. These were issued way back in 2019 according to the old State Gambling Act. At that time the authorities had accused the casino operators of not having applied for a licence to organise gambling. According to the old State Gambling Act this was not possible at the time.

Legal prerequisites for prohibition orders not given

The main reason for the repeal of both prohibition orders is primarily that the legal prerequisites have changed. Since the 1st. of July 2021 the fundamental ban on online casino games has been replaced by a so-called “prohibition subject to authority approval” (§ 4 Abs. 4 GlüStV). This means that from now on online gambling providers can apply for a licence to be able to provide legal virtual slot games and online poker. Consequently, with the introduction and implementation of the GlüStV, the casino operators will not be violating the internet ban, since this does not exist anymore. Accordingly, there was no other option but to revoke the current prohibition bans with immediate effect.

In its judgement of the 10^th. of May 2022, the Administrative Court Düsseldorf stated as follows:

“Finally, when the GlüStV came into force on the 1st. July 2021 there has been a turning point. This determines that the defendant would have had to base its assessment on a new basis, since infringements under the old legal situation would no longer justify an unfavourable assessment, provided no other circumstances occurred.”

The prohibition ban forbade the respective providers from organising gambling on the internet. Had the prohibition ban remained unchanged, the gambling providers would not have been able to acquire a German licence, since virtually all business activities were banned. Till now it is still not clear which casinos had their prohibition bans revoked. The casino operators were represented by the legal firm Hambach & Hambach, which is based in Munich.

In April 2022 we had already reported about another judgement, in which the District Court Frankenthal had determined that a player is not entitled to be paid out his casino winnings amounting to around 40,000 Euro.

Conclusion

With its judgement of the 10th. of May 2022, the Administrative Court has revoked two prohibition bans against casino operators and this with immediate effect. These were issued previously by the region of North Rhine-Westphalia. Since the GlüStV came into force in summer 2021, there are no legal grounds on which providers can be accused that they are violating the internet ban, since the latter was replaced by a so-called “prohibition subject to authority approval”. Thus, the court has decided in favour of the online gambling providers and opened up the opportunities for the online casinos, which have not been mentioned by name, to apply for a German licence.

Image source: https://pixabay.com/de/photos/justitia-göttin-2597016/