Arrests at the WSOP?

[Lawman007]

Using the rationale behind the recent arrests of online gaming executives, any employee of an online poker site in the United States could be subject to being arrested, including all of those employees of poker sites like PokerStars and Full Tilt who are currently at the WSOP.

Think about that. As far as our government is concerned, PokerStars and Full Tilt should be treated the same as illegal bookie operations. Even if they would only go after the top executives of the sites, people like Howard Lederer, who I've heard basically runs Full Tilt, and Lee Jones, the poker room manager for PokerStars, could be in the same boat as the execs who just got arrested.

Even members of the Full Tilt team, like Ferguson and Ivey, as well as the PokerStars spokesmen Raymer, Hachem, and Moneymaker could be at risk of being arrested for promoting illegal gambling operations. This could get really, really bad, folks.

[locutus2002]

Let's just give them Jurollo.

[cowboy.up]

As I said in another thread -

Grab your pitch forks and torches, and round up these wild ones. YEEEHAWWW. It's paddywagon time!

Can you see the feds raiding the WSOP? Talk about bad press...there's a lot more people that watch the WSOP on TV than play online poker. My grandmother, who does not play poker, but enjoys watching it on TV and can point out Phil Ivey and Doyle Brunson would even be outraged...and trust me, those politicians DO NOT want to upset my grandmother (who by the way even wrote a letter to our senator telling him to vote against HR 4411).

[Jack Bando]

So far, they've only arrested the top guys of internet casinos that have sportsbooks IIRC.

[Ron Burgundy]

Well, one thing is for sure: if that happens, there would be a lot more people writing to their senators to urge them to vote against HR 4411. It would be topic of every chat box online.

[Kneel B4 Zod]

what you're saying is possible, but to this day nobody has been arrested for anything involving online poker.

[BruinEric]

[ QUOTE ]
So far, they've only arrested the top guys of internet casinos that have sportsbooks IIRC.

[/ QUOTE ]

Party et al did themselves no favors in the world of "Poker is different, please treat us differently" when they linked their Poker rooms with their casino site.

Paradise and Bodog both offer Sports betting operations as well.

[Ignignokt]

Flash! Flash!

I understand federal authorities are at this moment moving to arrest this poker champion
http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/6093/moversaffleck200x256fh1.jpg

For crimes against motion pictures.

[vegasvinceq]

I work at the Rio and no one is bothering the online site people. We even have an official Full Tilt office dedicated to them on premises.

[JPFisher55]

I don't think that the DOJ wants to start a test case that it might lose. If they arrest one of these pro players for associating with an online poker site and lose, then they will no be able to intimitate the industry.

[The_Gunt]

They would have to prove that these people know and are helping to facilitate people from the US betting at these sites.

All of the ads that these people participate in are for the .net version of the websites which are free and legal.

I would imagine that they have a fairly decent defense, really, does Chris Money Maker get access to the ISP of the people playing on Pokerstars.com?

Could it also be that they are paid from a different corporation?

[Lawman007]

[ QUOTE ]
All of the adds that these people participate in are for the .net version of the websites which are free and legal.


[/ QUOTE ]

I don't believe that this is true. I don't have a poker magazine in front of me right now, but I'm pretty sure that the poker site ads in those magazines are for the ".com" sites, rather than the ".net" sites.

[dustyn]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
All of the adds that these people participate in are for the .net version of the websites which are free and legal.


[/ QUOTE ]

I don't believe that this is true. I don't have a poker magazine in front of me right now, but I'm pretty sure that the poker site ads in those magazines are for the ".com" sites, rather than the ".net" sites.

[/ QUOTE ]

I have also seen advertisements on TV for both partypoker.COM and fulltiltpoker.COM. They aren't on often, but I have seen them.

[IronDragon1]

Yeah, there's no chance that this happens. It would be a PR nightmare.

[Kneel B4 Zod]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
All of the adds that these people participate in are for the .net version of the websites which are free and legal.


[/ QUOTE ]

I don't believe that this is true. I don't have a poker magazine in front of me right now, but I'm pretty sure that the poker site ads in those magazines are for the ".com" sites, rather than the ".net" sites.

[/ QUOTE ]

guys - the publications/radio station/TV stations themselves determine what ads they will run. Party would much rather run a .com than a .net ad, so they will get away with it wherever they can. some people aren't really aware of the difference between .com and .net ads, so they just run whatever Party or whoever gives them.

[mattnxtc]

Also just read an article in the current Business week about the DoJ going after some white collar criminals in Brittain. These are people who had relationships with Enron. Apparently so far the Brittish are laughing at the thought of extraditing white collar criminals so i think we can expect the same for legal companies there too

[MicroBob]

this is correct.

If the magazine is comfortable running the dot-com ads then they are allowed to do so.

Some of them accepting such ads may not realize they are accepting a 'riskier' type of ad.
Seriously. It's not like some guy working at a random magazine in 'accounts' and setting up the ads (especially a non-poker magazine) is going to keep up with what is happening with online-poker in this country and that dot-net and dot-com are different.

most 'normal' people (who know nothing about poker) have no idea of these differences. This is why friends of my family might ask me, "How does Party Poker claim to NOT be a gambling website in those TV ads?"
And I explain that party-dot-net really IS a non-gambling site.
But Party-dot-com is the real-money site.


This is also how occasionally you will see a dot-com ad on TV. Sometimes it just sneaks in there because somebody along the lines at the TV station who was running it just didn't know that there is a difference.

[h11]

The three UK bankers were sent to the US per extradition treaty July 13 and have pled not guilty in US court. Extradition got them sent to US with UK support. But gambling? it's legal in UK so we can't use extradition to get a bookie for doing something legal in the UK. But US prosecutors might overcharge, and add charges such as fraud or some such junk. I don't think the UK can stop extradition if there is a decent case for that. The possibility of such ancillary charges, of acts illegal in both US and UK, would scare me, were I a gaming exec.

[Bilgefisher]

[ QUOTE ]
Yeah, there's no chance that this happens. It would be a PR nightmare.

[/ QUOTE ]

As much as I would hate to see top players arrested. I hope the government would be dumb enough to do this. The PR fiasco they would create would cause such a huge backlash that gambling online would be legal and regulated in the US within 2 years.

[Lawman007]

[ QUOTE ]
As much as I would hate to see top players arrested. I hope the government would be dumb enough to do this. The PR fiasco they would create would cause such a huge backlash that gambling online would be legal and regulated in the US within 2 years.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree.

[Little_Luck]

Why don't they arrest Dutch Boyd and there can be 1 arrest no one in the poker community would oppose.

[The_Scout]

[ QUOTE ]
Why don't they arrest Dutch Boyd and there can be 1 arrest no one in the poker community would oppose.

[/ QUOTE ]
Not quite true. Half of him would oppose it. The other half would be strongly in favor.

[StellarWind]

[ QUOTE ]
The three UK bankers were sent to the US per extradition treaty July 13 and have pled not guilty in US court. Extradition got them sent to US with UK support. But gambling? it's legal in UK so we can't use extradition to get a bookie for doing something legal in the UK. But US prosecutors might overcharge, and add charges such as fraud or some such junk. I don't think the UK can stop extradition if there is a decent case for that. The possibility of such ancillary charges, of acts illegal in both US and UK, would scare me, were I a gaming exec.

[/ QUOTE ]
Could the WTO ruling be introduced in a UK extradition hearing? The point being that the U.S. may be violating international law by prosecuting offshore internet gambling?

[Nate tha\\\' Great]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The three UK bankers were sent to the US per extradition treaty July 13 and have pled not guilty in US court. Extradition got them sent to US with UK support. But gambling? it's legal in UK so we can't use extradition to get a bookie for doing something legal in the UK. But US prosecutors might overcharge, and add charges such as fraud or some such junk. I don't think the UK can stop extradition if there is a decent case for that. The possibility of such ancillary charges, of acts illegal in both US and UK, would scare me, were I a gaming exec.

[/ QUOTE ]
Could the WTO ruling be introduced in a UK extradition hearing? The point being that the U.S. may be violating international law by prosecuting offshore internet gambling?

[/ QUOTE ]

There is no violation of international law or precedent that stems from merely charging a foreign national with a crime. If the UK thinks that the US has an invalid extradition claim, it can simply refuse to accede to the extradition request.

[Lawman007]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Why don't they arrest Dutch Boyd and there can be 1 arrest no one in the poker community would oppose.

[/ QUOTE ]
Not quite true. Half of him would oppose it. The other half would be strongly in favor.

[/ QUOTE ]

LMAO

[The_Gunt]

You guys are right I double checked Card Player magazine and they do have the .com ads. I haven't seen a .com ad on TV in a long time but maybe I am just not paying attention.