DOJ Seizes Online Poker Site Domains 379
An anonymous reader writes "Federal authorities have seized Internet domain names used by three major poker companies. The indictment charges eleven defendants (PDF), including the founders of PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker and Absolute Poker, with bank fraud, money laundering and illegal gambling offenses, according to Federal authorities in New York. The United States also filed a civil money laundering and in rem forfeiture complaint against the poker companies, their assets, and the assets of several payment processors for the poker companies."
Re:Hmm (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Fed up (Score:2, Informative)
The only reason for the fraud in the first place is because of the government's other laws. In other words, they would have been fine if it was legal for credit card companies and banks to do business with the sites. Don't try to excuse the government's actions here by claiming they "broke the law".
Re:Does anyone have a link to the indictment itsel (Score:5, Informative)
OK, I did some digging in PACER, where it looks like the documents have probably been filed but are probably still sealed.
The relevant case is in the Southern District of New York (https://ecf.nysd.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/ShowIndex.pl - anyone can sign up for a PACER account, they're free but you pay 8 cents per page, and if you charge less than $10 in a quarter it's free).
They're using an existing case, 1:10-cr-00336-LAK, which is all about the arrest and indictment of a gambling payment processor dude a year ago in April 2010.
See http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/arrests-follow-internet-high-flyers-release/story-e6frg6nf-1226039942478 [theaustralian.com.au] for more on the dude.
So the timeline is:
1) Gambling dude is arrested in 2010 and charged with some gambling-related crimes. See his indictment at http://tech.mit.edu/~mherdeg/10-cr-00336-lak-1.pdf [mit.edu]
2) Some time recently, he is (according to an Australian newspaper) secretly released from prison and prosecutors have not said whether he's still being charged
3) These 11 people are all being charged with 9 new crimes (documents not yet available, but apparently they'll be stored in this place / as part of this case number)
There have been a bunch of sealed documents added to the case recently; maybe they include the complaint and indictment that the press release talks about. You can see the history I got from PACER at http://tech.mit.edu/~mherdeg/10-cr-00336-entries.txt [mit.edu].
Re:Victimless "crime" (Score:5, Informative)
I disagree.
I would rather have the freedom to choose whether or not I would risk my money in an unregulated gambling house than to be forced by the government to not gamble.
In either case, the result is the same...I wouldn't gamble. But I sill believe in the right to choose.
Bro, read. Bank fraud and money laundering are among the charges. Not every act of prosecution is about is about attacking your right to choose. I know this is slashdot and people don't RTFA, but c'mon.
Jon Kyl of Arizona was a big gambling-law pusher (Score:5, Informative)
Senator Kyl, a right-winger from Arizona, was one of the big pushers of Federal laws against online gambling. He didn't want it left to the states, and didn't want Americans to be able to gamble at non-US gambling houses. It's always nice to know how strongly Republicans believe in small government that stays out of people's personal lives and leaves decisions to the states when they don't need to be Federal.