FBI officials announced today the arrest of than 30 people charged in connection with schemes involving illegal sports betting and rigged poker games backed by the Mafia, including Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups and Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier.
Billups and Rozier were among a total of 34 people arrested.
FBI director Kash Patel said in a statement that the arrests were the result of a yearslong investigation covering 11 states and involving tens of millions of dollars.
Patel and other law enforcement officials said the multiple charges involve four Mafia families and organized crime networks, including members of the La Cosa Nostra crime families, and “mind-boggling” amounts of fraud.
According to ESPN, Rozier was arrested Thursday morning at a hotel in Orlando, Florida.
He is accused of participating in an illegal sports betting scheme using private insider NBA information. Rozier did not play in Wednesday’s season opening loss to the Orlando Magic due to a coach’s decision.
According to the indictment from the FBI, Rozier and other defendants “had access to private information known by NBA players or NBA coaches” that was likely to affect the outcome of games or players’ performances and provided that information to other coconspirators in exchange for either a flat fee or a share of betting profits.
U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York Joseph Nocella Jr. called it “one of the most brazen sports corruption schemes since online sports betting became widely legalized in the United States.”
ESPN reported that Billups, a former standout player and current head coach of the Trail Blazer, was arrested in Oregon and is charged in a separate indictment alleging a wide-ranging scheme to rig underground poker games that were backed by Mafia families.
Both Billups and Rozier are accused of using technology to steal millions from victims in the New York area, Nocella said.
The duo are expected to make initial court appearances later Thursday in Oregon and Florida, respectively.
“Day in and day out, this FBI is following the money — and today is the result of that outstanding work,” FBI Director Kash Patel told Fox News.
“This operation involved an expansive effort across 11 states arresting 34 subjects, including multiple NBA players and coaches, who allegedly took advantage of their own positions of power to rig gambling systems for their own benefit — eventually funneling money to La Cosa Nostra, enriching some of the most notorious criminal networks in the world. That ends today — and the FBI’s efforts to make sure gambling operations of all kinds stay within the law are only beginning. Thank you to the outstanding men and women of the FBI who pursued this case and followed the facts accordingly.”
According to initial reports, the arrests are part of a larger federal investigation, dubbed Operation Zhen Diagram, into a nationwide gambling ring allegedly involving members of the La Cosa Nostra crime families who allegedly defrauded unwitting victims of millions.
The operation overlapped with a separate investigation, dubbed Nothing But Bet, involving a probe into fixed NCAA basketball games. The FBI said the ring included current and former NBA players.
“Your winning streak has ended. Your luck has run out. Violating the law is a losing proposition and you can bet on that,” U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York Joseph Nocella said.
James Trusty, of Ifrah Law PLLC, released a statement on Rozier’s arrest:
“We have represented Terry Rozier for over a year. A long time ago we reached out to these prosecutors to tell them we should have an open line of communication,” Trusty said.
“They characterized Terry as a subject, not a target, but at 6 a.m. this morning they called to tell me FBI agents were trying to arrest him in a hotel.
“It is unfortunate that instead of allowing him to self surrender they opted for a photo op. They wanted the misplaced glory of embarrassing a professional athlete with a perp walk. That tells you a lot about the motivations in this case. They appear to be taking the word of spectacularly in-credible sources rather than relying on actual evidence of wrongdoing. Terry was cleared by the NBA and these prosecutors revived that non-case. Terry is not a gambler, but he is not afraid of a fight, and he looks forward to winning this fight.”
The Trail Blazers and Heat have not yet commented on the arrests or investigation at the time of publication.