Seven bosses believe he should have told them, as his main employer, immediately that he had been removed from the venue and banned from all Crown premises for two years last week, but instead, they read about it in the Herald Sun on Monday.

Lewis Martin, managing director of Seven Melbourne, has been contacted for comment.

Radio station Triple M has also taken Carey off all on-air duties until all investigations are concluded.

Carey has chosen not to file his column for The Age this week.

Carey has previously said he offered to hand the bag to Crown staff after dropping it at a gaming table. But Crown Resorts chief executive Ciaran Carruthers, who is in his first week on the job, told 6PR that Carey’s claim contradicted the version of events from Crown staff.

“My understanding is that they didn’t know that it was Mr Carey that was at the table. It was a customer that was buying in for chips at the time,” he said.

“[Gaming floor staff] noticed the packet fall out along with the notes and they advised their gaming manager.

“He kept it [the bag] and beyond what’s happened, beyond that, I have no idea what’s happened to it. He removed it from the table, placed it back on his ... person and then moved on.”

He said Carey’s description was “in contradiction to the statements that we’ve received from our own staff and from witnesses who were there at the time”.

Carruthers also said Carey did not tell staff he was staying at Crown.

“When asked whether or not he was staying on property, he advised our team that he was not a guest of the hotel and we subsequently found that that was not the case and he was staying in one of the hotel rooms,” he said.

“Our team then approached him in his room and advised him that he needed to vacate, he cooperated, he asked for some time to collect his belongings, which we gave him. He then removed himself from the property.”

Carey maintains the bag contained a small amount of anti-inflammatory medication, branded Aleve, which he regularly takes for pain.

“It was not an illegal substance. It was offered to security. Security didn’t take it,” Carey said on Monday.

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“They just said it’s not a great look. I understood that, and we left without incident.”

On Wednesday, Maurice Blackburn lawyers said they had been retained by the former footballer to assess whether he was unlawfully discriminated against.

Carruthers also denied Carey had been treated unfairly.

“We could not have been aware even if it were true that there was an issue with health. We dealt with this as we would deal with any notification of suspicious activity on the property,” he said.

Carey declined to comment.

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