The Court of Santiago admits Latamwin's appeal against the blocking
The blocking of 42 betting sites in Chile will have to be defended in court. The Court of Appeals of Santiago declared admissible the writ of protection filed by Grupo Latamwin, owner of the Latamwin and WinChile brands, against the joint decision by the Superintendencia de Casinos de Juego (SCJ) and the Subsecretaría de Telecomunicaciones (Subtel) that took a set of platforms offline.
Admissibility has an immediate effect. It obliges both bodies to present a report and to respond in writing to two specific accusations made by W&C N.V., the company behind these brands: that the act was illegal and that it was issued without the necessary powers.
The central argument of the writ is one of competence. The company argues that the SCJ does not have the authority to declare a platform illegal and that its actions seriously violate the constitutional rights and guarantees of the group. What it requests is an order not to innovate and an immediate halt to the actions taken by both bodies, something that in practice would oblige internet providers to reopen these domains.
Wilfred Adelsdorfer, CEO of the group, interpreted the decision as a validation of their operating method and stated that it demonstrates the company has been acting transparently and within the law.
The crux of the case, as he explained to La Tercera, is how their brands ended up on that list. Latamwin and WinChile were not among the sites affected by the legal dispute that Lotería de Concepción initiated against six telecommunications companies, nor are they mirrors or redirects of any other domain. Adelsdorfer emphasized that it was the plaintiff itself that placed them in a separate category, that of platforms awaiting qualification, and that no one ever claimed they derived from an already judged site. Even so, they ended up with the same punishment.
His objection is not to the ruling but to its scope. He stated that there was no prior notice or channel to rectify the error before the block was imposed, and he was explicit: the Supreme Court's ruling is not in dispute for them. They ask that it be executed within the perimeter that the court itself drew, because a ruling applies to those who litigated, and extending it ex officio to third parties, in their view, is no longer compliance but expansion.
Chile maintains no specific regulation for online casinos and sportsbooks, while the SCJ exclusively oversees licensed land-based activity. This boundary is what is under discussion in the file, and it comes at a particular moment for the body, which is undergoing a selection process to appoint its next superintendent after seven months without a head.
Tags: Latamwin Group, Superintendency of Gaming Casinos, betting site blocking, Santiago Court of Appeals