"Your luck has run out, and you can bet on that" was the US Attorney for New York, Joseph Nocella's, message to 31 defendants who have been arrested in a coordinated set of indictments.
Former NBA player Damon Jones, current player Terry Rozier and Portland Trail Blazers Head Coach, Chauncey Billups, are among those charged with a range of gambling and gambling-related offences in this 'massive nationwide takedown.'
A multi-year investigation by the FBI into suspicious betting by high-profile NBA figures and an illegal ring of rigged poker games has culminated in this dramatic day of arrests.
Nocella and FBI Director Kash Patel spoke at a press conference in New York today, outlining details from the two separate, but linked, investigations.
Three defendants are involved in both of the cases, but the allegations of illegal gambling with regards to the poker games is said to have been backed by members of the Bonanno, Gambino and Genovese crime families.
According to Nocella, victims, known as 'fish,' were lured to poker games in New York, Las Vegas and Miami, enticed by the possibility of playing with current and ex-professional athletes, known as 'face cards.'
At that point, the alleged scam began, with the aid of high-tech cheating technology, including X-ray tables, card-reading shuffling machines and specially manufactured contact lenses.
On the sports betting side, the defendants within the NBA, namely Rozier, Jones and Billups, would share insider information relating to players pulling out of matches and then use a network of conspirators to place bets online and in casinos around the country.
In both indictments there are additional charges of money laundering and reports of violence and extortion.
Christopher Reia, the FBI Assistant Director of the New York Field Office, says that victims were 'hustled' out of tens of millions of dollars over the years in which these offenses were reportedly being perpetrated, between 2019 and now.
The NBA is said to be cooperating with the probe.
Last year, NBA player Jontay Porter of the Toronto Raptors was handed a lifetime ban from the sport after being found to have shared insider information
