On Thursday, the U.S. federal police arrested Terry Rozier, Miami Heat player, and Chauncey Billups, Portland Trail Blazers coach, as part of two separate but connected investigations on a vast system of illegal betting and tricked poker games. Both cases are part of a wider investigation into gambling managed by groups related to Italian-American mafia. The NBA confirmed that Rozier and Billups were fired with immediate effect.
Rozier, who has been playing in NBA for ten years, is accused of using confidential information to bet on several games between 2023 and 2024, some of which saw him in the field. According to the prosecution, on at least one occasion he would simulate an injury to alter the outcome of bets. The proceeds would then be recycled through a network of intermediaries, including former player Damon Jones, also investigated. Rozier and five others are accused of association with criminals aimed at fraud and money laundering.
Billups, former NBA player and champion in 2004 with the Detroit Pistons, is involved in a separate investigation into poker games. Inquirents argue that a group of 31 people had organized a system to scam other players, using technological devices that can read the order of cards and tables modified with hidden cameras. Some investigators are accused of fraud, others of more serious crimes such as extortion and robbery.
According to the Department of Justice, members and affiliates of four of New York’s main mafia “families” are included in the poker survey: Gambino, Genovese, Lucchese and Bonanno. It is an exceptional fact, since a federal investigation rarely manages to simultaneously touch more organizations of this level. The authorities believe that the control of illegal gambling remains one of the most profitable activities for these criminal networks, despite the expansion of the legal market.
Sports betting in the United States has only become legal since 2018, when a Supreme Court ruling allowed individual states to regulate them. Today they are allowed in 38 states and represent a booming sector: from 2018 to today, Americans spent nearly $500 billion on authorized platforms. However, the authorities fear that the growth of the legal market may have favoured new infiltration opportunities for illegal gaming and money laundering.
Article There is a big inquiry into sports betting that also involved the NBA comes from IlNewyorkese.
