The Cullen Commission is getting back underway this morning, with Mountie-turned-whistleblower Fred Pinnock continuing his testimony. Follow along for updates. @NEWS1130 #bcpoli https://twitter.com/byGawley/status/1324507156390023169

Pinnock is now being questioned by counsel for B.C.’s Gaming Policy and Enforcement Branch and the Ministry of Finance is now questioning Pinnock.

Commission counsel Patrick McGowan is now questioning Pinnock again. He's asking about a 2008 conversatoin Pinnock said he had with then-minister Kash Heed, in which he says Heed told him Min. Rich Coleman was uninterested in probing money laundering.

Pinnock says he recorded conversations with Heed in 2018, one in person and one on the phone. He says he wanted to preserve evidence of what happened.

He says he recorded those conversations without Heed's knowledge.

Transcripts of the recordings will be entered with parts of them redacted. No one is allowed to discuss what's contained in those redacted portions.

BCLC lead counsel William Smart says the transcripts contain information and opinions about several people, who should have the opportunity to respond.

Commissioner Cullen says that's a fair point and others might want to ask for further redactions of the transcripts.

McGowan says it will probably take until end of Monday to contact people mentioned in the recordings and give them an opportunity to seek a redaction to protect their reputations.

Cullen agrees, says Heed and Pinnock should also have chance to seek further redactions.

The next witness is now set to testify. Tom Robertson preceded Pinnock as the commander of IIGET.

He was a Mountie for 30 years, followed by nine year with the gaming enforcement branch.

Robertson says his focus at IIGET was "illegal gaming": gaming houses, unlicensed bingos and raffles, loan sharking, money laundering

illegal video lottery machines and gaming houses were the main focus, he says.

Robertson says his understanding was his mandate included illegal activity in licensed casinos, including money laundering and loansharking.

Commissioner counsel Kyle McCleery is taking Robertson through a number of documents laying out IIGET's mandate. The intent seems to be to show the RCMP team had the mandate to investigate dirty money in casinos -- at least on paper.

Robertson is describing efforts to crack down on illegal Texas Hold'em games at bars. Along with illegal bingo halls, he said his team encouraged these businesses to get proper licensing.

Robertson said he wanted to focus on these types of infractions because he and his team didn't have experience and "very little knowledge" of investigating money laundering or proceeds of crime.

Investigating that kind of complex investigation would be much more time consuming and resource intensive and would make them unavailable to respond to requests to look into illegal gaming at cafes, etc.

A series of smaller investigations, each taking a couple weeks, would less likely lead to mistakes.

Robertson said it would "look better" if he could report a number of successful small investigations, rather than one big one with no results to report for weeks or months.

Robertson says he hadn't considered whether a series of smaller investigations could eventually lead to bigger investagations of money laundering and loan sharking.

To probe those, he thought he would need more resources and people.

Unlike Pinnock, Robertson said he did not have a troubled relationship with the leadership of GPEB. Never had bad feedback or relations with them, he says.

A River Rock security guard reported suspected loansharking. IIGET looked into it but didn't find sufficient evidence.

Robertson says he did not think IIGET or GPEB had the mandate or capacity to investigate money laundering in casinos.

Robertson says his team "ruffled feathers" of people at Great Canadian Casinos.

Larry Vander Graff of GPEB apparently told Robertson that IIGET did not have the mandate to investigate illegal activity at legal casinos.

Robertson says GPEB didn't want IIGET to go into casinos and ask questions. "That was sort of their venue."

IIGET would go to GPEB responsible for a venue and ask to attend with them if they had questions. "There was no pushback that I recall."

In a meeting with Pinnock, Robertson says he told him he didn't think IIGET didn't have the resources to investigate an online casino. Pinnock disagreed.

Robertson says he responded to a call from a Kelowna casino after someone bought in for roughly $2,000 in $20 bills.

He spoke to the guy who said he owned a pizza restaurant. He didn't believe the answers, believed $ was from illegal activity.

Casino refunded his money in $20s and didn't allow him to gamble, Robertson says.

Robertson says people involved in drug trafficking are known to have lots of smaller bills and that's a "problem for them."

Robertson is now being questioned by Joanna Stratton, representing GPEB and B.C.'s Ministry of Finance.

Robertson says he was aware that when he was in kelowna, he was aware there were cash buy-ins in the 100s of thousands of $$$ in the Lower Mainland.

Ashely Gardner, counsel for the Gov't of Canada, asks Robertson if he knows what the investigative steps are to probe money laundering.

Robertson says the challenge is to follow the "trail of money" to find its source: surveillance, wiretaps, etc.

For clarity: Robertson was with GPEB while in Kelowna after retiring from the RCMP.

With the phrase of the year -- "I'm sorry I was muted" -- Commissioner Cullen gets the hearing back underway.

BCLC's Smart is now questioning Robertson.

Smart is also taking Robertson through documentation that Robertson agrees shows IIGET and GPEB (officially) had the shared responsibility to ensure the integrity of legal gambling.