Billups, Rozier arrested in gambling investigations

Portland Trail Blazers coach Chauncey Billups, Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier and former Cleveland Cavaliers player and assistant coach Damon Jones have been arrested as part of a pair of wide-ranging investigations related to illegal sports betting and rigged poker games backed by the Mafia, authorities announced Thursday.

Billups and Rozier have been placed on leave from their teams, the NBA said in a statement.

A total of 34 people were arrested as the result of a yearslong investigation covering 11 states and involving tens of millions of dollars, FBI director Kash Patel said. Law enforcement officials said the multiple charges involve four Mafia families and organized crime networks, with Patel saying of the money involved that «the fraud is mind-boggling.»

Rozier, who was arrested Thursday morning at a hotel in Orlando, Florida, is accused of participating in an illegal sports betting scheme using insider NBA information. As part of the scheme, gamblers used nonpublic information to bet on at least seven NBA games between March 2023 and March 2024 involving the Charlotte Hornets, Orlando Magic, Trail Blazers, Los Angeles Lakers and Toronto Raptors, according to the indictment. In three of the seven games, players intentionally removed themselves from contests to benefit the gamblers’ bets, according to the indictment.

The defendants «had access to private information known by NBA players or NBA coaches» that would likely affect the outcome of games or players’ performances and provided that information to other co-conspirators in exchange for either a flat fee or a share of betting profits, according to the indictment.

«Let’s not mince words,» Patel said. «This is the insider trading saga for the NBA, that’s what this is.»

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.»

Billups, who was arrested in Oregon, is charged in a separate indictment alleging a wide-ranging scheme to rig underground poker games that were backed by Mafia families, authorities said. The defendants are accused of using technology to steal millions from victims in the New York area, Nocella said.

Also, though Billups was not named in the sports betting indictment, the description of a co-conspirator who allegedly told a bettor that a number of Trail Blazers players would miss a March 2023 game had a playing and coaching career that matches Billups.

Billups and Rozier have been indicted on charges of wire fraud conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy. According to Assistant U.S. Attorney Diane Hu, each count carries no more than 20 years in prison.

Hours after his arrest, Rozier appeared in a federal court in Orlando, Florida, wearing a Charlotte Hornets sweatshirt, handcuffs and shackles. Billups appeared before a judge in Portland, Oregon. Both men were ordered released from custody on certain conditions.

Prosecutors, in their detention memo, asked a judge to impose «substantial bail conditions» on all the defendants in the poker rigging case and noted that Billups has «substantial financial resources.»

Billups is scheduled to appear at the federal courthouse in Brooklyn on Nov. 24. His attorney, Chris Heywood, declined to comment after the hearing.

Billups also turned over his passport and is required to secure a substantial bond with the federal court in the Eastern District of New York. His travel is limited to Oregon and Colorado, and he also is prohibited from any gambling-related activity.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Robert Norway on Thursday said Rozier would be released from custody after putting up his Florida home as bond and surrendering his passport. Conditions for release also stated Rozier would be prohibited from gambling and restricted only to travel within the continental United States.

The NBA said both had been placed on «immediate leave» from their teams.

«We take these allegations with the utmost seriousness, and the integrity of our game remains our top priority,» the league said in its statement.

Trail Blazers assistant Tiago Splitter will serve as the interim head coach. Portland canceled its previously planned practice availability with reporters on Thursday afternoon.

«We are aware of the allegations involving head coach Chauncey Billups, and the Trail Blazers are fully cooperating with the investigation,» the Trail Blazers said in a statement.

According to Nocella, six defendants are accused of being involved in the sports betting case, while there are 31 defendants allegedly involved in rigged poker games. Three people, including Jones, were named as defendants in both cases. In addition to Rozier and Jones, bettors Eric Earnest, Marves Fairley, Shane Hennen and Deniro Laster were named as defendants in the sports betting indictment.

ESPN previously reported that Fairley is involved in a gambling ring targeting college basketball games. Hennen was arrested in January at the Las Vegas airport, where he was attempting to board an international flight.

Before a March 23, 2023, game against the New Orleans Pelicans, Rozier, who then played for the Hornets, allegedly told Laster, a childhood friend, that he would remove himself from the game in the first quarter due to a supposed injury, according to the indictment. Laster allegedly sold the information to two bettors for about $100,000.

Those bettors, along with their associates and a network of proxy bettors, used the info to bet on Rozier’s unders, according to the indictment. The money wagered was in the hundreds of thousands, according to the indictment. Many of the bets won after Rozier removed himself from the game after nine minutes, with 5 points, 2 assists and 4 rebounds.

Rozier paid for Laster to travel to Philadelphia to collect the proceeds from the scheme, according to the indictment, and then drove to Rozier’s home to count the money with him.

Rozier’s lawyer, Jim Trusty of Ifrah Law, said in a statement that his client is «not a gambler» and «looks forward to winning this fight.»

«The integrity of the game is paramount to NBA players, but so is the presumption of innocence, and both are hindered when player popularity is misused to gain attention,» a National Basketball Players Association spokesperson said in a statement. «We will ensure our members are protected and afforded their due process rights through this process.»

Jones, who played and coached for the Cavaliers and worked as an unofficial assistant coach for the Lakers during the 2022-23 NBA season, allegedly sold inside information to bettors, according to the indictment. Jones had a close relationship with «a prominent NBA player» during his time with the Cavaliers and the Lakers and had access to insider information through that relationship, according to the filing.

The indictment does not name the player, but a source told ESPN’s Dave McMenamin that it was Lakers star LeBron James.

Before a Lakers game against the Milwaukee Bucks on Feb. 9, 2023, Jones texted a co-conspirator to «get a big bet on Milwaukee tonight» because the prominent player was out. James did not play in that game, a Lakers loss.

James was unaware of any gambling activity by Jones, a source close to James told ESPN. James has not been accused of any wrongdoing.

A month later, a defendant referred to as «Co-Conspirator 8» allegedly told a bettor that the Trail Blazers would be tanking and that several of their best players would not be playing in a March 24, 2023, game against the Chicago Bulls. Four regular Portland starters did not play as the Trail Blazers lost by 28.

Co-Conspirator 8 was not named in the indictment but was described in a manner that matches Billups.

The case stems from the betting scandal involving former Raptors center Jontay Porter, who was banned from the NBA in the spring of 2024 and is awaiting sentencing for his role in a gambling scheme around player prop bets. Porter admitted in court to manipulating his performance in two games during the 2023-24 season. Two of the conspirators in the Porter case, Ammar Awawdeh and Hennen, were also named as defendants in the poker indictment unsealed Thursday.

In the poker case, Billups and Jones are accused of using their celebrity to lure people into playing in poker games that were rigged by the Mafia, Nocella said. The organizers allegedly used «sophisticated cheating technologies,» including shuffling machines that could read the cards in the deck, poker chip trays with hidden cameras, special contact lenses and glasses that could read pre-marked cards, and an X-ray table that could read cards facedown on the table, according to Nocella.

Once the so-called «fish» lost, the Mafia used extortion and violence to make sure they paid their gambling debts, Nocella said. Investigators found that the scheme involved members and associates of the Bonanno, Gambino, Lucchese and Genovese crime families, New York City Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said.

Since April 2019, victims have lost at least $7 million in the rigged poker games, according to the indictment, with one victim alone losing $1.8 million.

Billups, who was known as a «face card» in the scheme, helped to organize and played in games held in Las Vegas using a rigged shuffling machine in April 2019, where they defrauded victims of at least $50,000, according to the indictment.

Following another rigged game in October 2020, Billups was wired $50,000 for his participation, the memo states.

«Victims believed that they were sitting at a fair table,» Tisch said. «Instead, they were cheated out of millions.»

Malik Beasley, an NBA free agent who is under federal investigation for gambling allegations, was not mentioned in the indictments Thursday. His attorney previously told ESPN that Beasley is not a target of the investigation.

The federal investigations are ongoing, Nocella said. ESPN previously reported that some of the same gambling accounts that bet on Porter and Rozier props also bet on college basketball games. Sources told ESPN that the FBI has been interviewing college athletes and that they believe indictments are forthcoming.

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.