In an announcement that rocked the NBA, federal authorities on Thursday unveiled indictments and arrests as part of what FBI director Kash Patel called “a wide-sweeping criminal enterprise that envelops both the NBA and La Cosa Nostra.” Among the accused: Basketball Hall of Famer and current Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups, Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier and former NBA player and assistant coach Damon Jones.
U.S. Attorneys in the Eastern District of New York and Patel announced the indictments at a news conference in Brooklyn. More than a dozen U.S. government officials huddled around the podium under fluorescent lights with hands clasped, as Patel and others touted their investigations: “Operation Royal Flush,” and “Operation Nothing But Bet.”
All told, 34 people were indicted Thursday: six for a scheme to rig performances and share inside information in NBA games; 28 for a case in which the Mafia allegedly rigged poker games; and three for both cases.
In the case involving NBA games, a grand jury indicted Rozier and Jones alongside Rozier’s friend Deniro Laster, Eric Earnest, Shane Hennen and Marves Fairley. Hennen was arrested in January and has been negotiating a plea deal. reported in February that Fairley’s name has come up repeatedly in the investigation as a possible co-conspirator, but authorities had not publicly named him until Thursday. Hennen’s attorney, Todd Leventhal, tells SI, “We are still reviewing the documents. But Shane maintains his innocence and we intend to fight these charges to the fullest.”
Billups was not indicted in that case—but “Co-Conspirator 8” is described in the indictment as a resident of Oregon who was “an NBA player from approximately 1997 through 2014, and an NBA coach since at least 2021.” That describes Billups.
The indictment alleges that Co-Conspirator 8 “told the defendant Eric Earnest that the Trail Blazers were going to be tanking [i.e., intentionally losing] to increase their odds of getting a better draft pick in the upcoming NBA draft. Co-Conspirator 8 told Earnest, before the news was publicly announced, that several of the Trail Blazers’ best players, including Player 1, an individual whose identity is known to the Grand Jury, would not be playing in the March 24 Game” against the Bulls. The gambling ring then allegedly wagered “approximately $100,000” against the Trail Blazers. Portland lost, 124–96.
According to New York City police commissioner Jessica Tisch, before a game between the Hornets and Pelicans on March 23, 2023, when Rozier was on Charlotte’s roster, Rozier “allegedly let others close to him know that he planned to leave the game early with a supposed injury. Using that information, members of the group placed more than $200,000 in wagers on his ‘under’ statistics.”
Rozier, who started the game, played only nine minutes, 34 seconds.
The allegation against Rozier is virtually the same as what former Toronto Raptors player Jontay Porter admitted to doing in court last year. Porter pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud after rigging his own performance to ensure the under on prop bets would win. Porter said during his plea hearing that he did it “in order to get out from under large gambling debts accumulated over time.” Authorities have said one of the people Porter owed significantly gambling debts to was Ammar Awawdeh, who was indicted in that case and has been negotiating a plea deal. Awawdeh was indicted again Thursday for his alleged role in the poker scheme.
Joseph Nocella Jr., the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said the defendants in that case, which include Jones and Rozier, “also misused information obtained through long-standing friendships that they had with NBA players and coaches.”
The second case involves rigged poker games. According to Patel and the Justice Department, four of the New York mafia’s five families were involved in the scheme: the Bonanno, Gambino, Genovese and Lucchese families. They say the perpetrators used poker chip tray analyzers, special contact lenses or eyeglasses, and an X-ray table to dupe players out of hundreds of thousands of dollars—and that Billups and Jones were in on the scheme.
The game-rigging indictments seem fairly straightforward: NBA players, coaches and their associates revealed information to gamblers that was not publicly available, and the gamblers used that information to place wagers, which were usually (though not always) successful.
But there are two ways that scheme could be executed, and the difference has enormous implications for the NBA and everybody involved.
In one scenario, the insiders knew exactly how the information would be used—and even altered performances to ensure the outcome of a bet. This is why the Justice Department charged Rozier: It says that when Rozier told Laster he would leave the Hornets’ March 23, 2023, game with an injury, “Rozier provided this information to Laster for the purpose of enabling Laster to place wagers based on this information.”
Laster, like Rozier, is from Cleveland. He played college football for Minnesota, Kentucky and North Carolina Central from 2014 to ’17. The indictment says Laster then “sold the information” about Rozier’s plan to Fairley and an unnamed “Co-Conspirator 1,” who is described as a former NBA player. The price for the information was $100,000, according to the complaint.
Fairley, in turn, passed along the information to Hennen, who made wagers himself and “through a network of straw bettors” on Rozier’s unders. Hennen bet $61,200 directly on Rozier’s totals or as part of parlays. Other conspirators, both named and unnamed in the complaint, placed wagers totaling nearly $200,000 on Rozier’s performance, according to the indictment.
The other scenario is that an insider shared information with a confidant (Jones)—but did not know how it would be used. This appears to be how the Justice Department views the actions of some of those around NBA stars LeBron James and Anthony Davis.
The indictment says that for many years, Jones was a teammate or coach of a prominent NBA player (“Player 3”)—and that Jones had access to non-public information, including medical information, “by virtue of his relationship with Player 3, the Lakers and other NBA personnel.”
The rest of the indictment makes it clear that Player 3 is James, who played with Jones in Cleveland from 2005 to ’08.
The indictment says that before the Lakers-Bucks game on Feb. 9, 2023, Jones texted a co-conspirator: “Get a big bet on Milwaukee tonight before the information is out! [Player 3] is out tonight. Bet enough so Djones can eat to [sic] now!!!”
James missed that game. The indictment doesn't accuse James of any misconduct, nor does it allege James supplied any information or that he was aware of Jones's actions.
Davis appears in the indictment as “Player 4.” Before the Lakers’ Jan. 15, 2024, game against the Thunder, Jones “claimed to have learned from the trainer for Players 3 and 4 that Player 4 was injured and was only going to play a limited number of minutes and/or his performance would likely be affected in the game because of the injury,” according to the indictment. Jones then told co-defendant Earnest, who told Fairley. Fairley then allegedly paid Jones approximately $2,500 and shared the information with Hennen and another co-conspirator.
The indictment says Fairley wagered “approximately $100,000” against the Lakers.
Player 4 was listed as “probable” on the injury report. Davis was the only Lakers player listed as probable that day, with a left ankle sprain/bone bruise. But he played 38 minutes and scored 27 points. (“Ultimately, Player 4 played in the January 15 Game in line with his season
average in minutes and performed well,” the indictment, which doesn’t accuse Davis of wrongdoing, says.) Fairley then allegedly asked Earnest to ask Jones to repay the $2,500.
The alleged poker scheme was more complex, and involved far more people, including members of some of the most powerful organized crime syndicates in the country. Among those indicted: former professional boxer Curtis Meeks.
The government says Hennen and Meeks “[…] together with others, supplied other defendants and their co-conspirators in the Scheme with cheating technology.” The indictment also alleges that defendants and their co-conspirators “used shuffling machines that had been secretly altered to use concealed technology to read the cards in the deck, predict which player at the table had the best poker hand, and relay that information via interstate wires to an off-site operator.”
According to the indictment: “On numerous occasions, certain defendants and their co-conspirators invited the Victims, who were often wealthy, to Rigged Games. To attract the Victims, in some instances, well-known former professional athletes participated in the Rigged Poker Scheme and were referred to as ‘Face Cards.’ ”
The government says Billups and Jones were both “Face Cards.”
Interestingly, while the justice department says Billups was an accomplice in the poker scheme that he shared inside information about his team to Earnest, it did not charge him with a crime for the leak. The implication is that the government believes it can prove Billups knew about the poker scheme, but it cannot prove that when Billups told Earnest the Trail Blazers would bench key players, he knew how Earnest would use the information.
On a slower news day, a sitting head coach telling a confidant that his team was “going to be tanking (i.e., intentionally losing) to increase their odds of getting a better draft pick in the upcoming NBA draft” would be an enormous story. On Thursday, it was essentially a footnote.
For Billups in particular, this is a stunning turn of events. Besides being a Basketball Hall of Famer and the 2004 NBA Finals MVP, Billups was one of the most popular players of his era among fellow players. When the league created the Twyman–Stokes Teammate of the Year award in 2013, Billups was the inaugural winner. Billups is in his fifth season as coach of the Trail Blazers.
Jones filed for bankruptcy in 2013 and ’15, according to court documents. He last played in the NBA in ’09 and was an assistant coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers from ’16 to ’18.
Rozier’s attorney, Jim Trusty, released this statement after the news conference:
“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. 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.”
SIdid not immediately reach representatives for Billups or Jones.
The NBA said Billups and Rozier were “placed on immediate leave from their teams” and the league is cooperating with authorities.
The NBPA released a statement to SI: “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. We will ensure our members are protected and afforded their due process rights through this process.”
Nocella pointed out that the indictments and arrests announced Thursday did not involve college basketball. A separate wing of federal law enforcement, the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, has been spearheading the investigation on the college level. The NCAA concurrently has been investigating what it terms “integrity cases” in men’s college basketball, where player performances were allegedly altered for gambling purposes.
In September, the NCAA announced that it was pursuing infractions cases against 13 players from six schools: Eastern Michigan, Temple, Arizona State, New Orleans, North Carolina A&T and Mississippi Valley State. The NCAA also announced that “additional cases are in various stages of the investigation process.”
Some athletes who played for the named schools have been connected to the same gambling ring involved in the NBA games, multiple sources tell SI. Players from at least another half-dozen schools could be implicated, with more information being uncovered as inquiries continue. The majority of implicated programs are at the mid-major and low-major level of Division I basketball.
Most of the players involved in the college scandal have concluded their eligibility, but others who are still active players are under investigation, sources say. The college basketball season begins Nov. 3.
NCAA president Charlie Baker issued a statement about the federal gambling investigation Thursday afternoon: “We are grateful for federal law enforcement’s efforts to stamp out illegal sports betting, and I am proud that the NCAA continues to have the most aggressive competition integrity policies in place. The Association has and will continue to pursue sports betting violations using a layered integrity monitoring program for over 22,000 contests, but we still need more states, regulators and gaming companies to help in this effort by eliminating risky prop bets to reduce opportunities for manipulation.”
