As new developments come to light in the recent illegal gambling scandal, it appears the alleged cheaters used high-tech equipment to scam victims.
Authorities said the rigged poker games involving athletes and the mafia used rigged shuffle machines, special glasses or contact lenses to read marked cards, and “x-ray tables” to ensure winning sessions.
A multi-year investigation involving several law enforcement agencies ultimately led to numerous arrests on Thursday. Those arrests included current Portland Trail Blazers head coach and NBA Hall of Famer Chauncey Billups. Law enforcement also arrested Miami Heat point guard Terry Rozier in a separate case involving match fixing and fraud.
U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York Joseph Nocella and FBI Director Kash Patel detailed the poker scheme. They described the rigged poker game as a wide-ranging cheating operation centered in the New York area run by the Bonanno, Gambino, Lucchese, and Genovese crime families.
“This is an illegal gambling operation and sports rigging operation that spanned the course of years,” said Patel. “The FBI led a coordinated takedown across 11 states to arrest over 30 individuals today responsible for this case, which is very much ongoing. Not only did we crack into the fraud that these perpetrators committed on the grand stage of the NBA, but we also entered and executed a system of justice against La Cosa Nostra.”
Those in custody now face multiple charges. The charges include wire fraud, money laundering, extortion, robbery, and illegal gambling. The FBI alleged the poker and sports betting schemes generated tens of millions of dollars.
Game Continuously Moved Cities
The indictment of the poker case offers a look at how the mobsters allegedly lured high-stakes players to the games.
The operation began in 2019 with games in 2019. However, the indictment notes that the games were held in other parts of the country as well. According to Nocella, they also held the game in Las Vegas and Miami.
“The Washington Place game and Lexington Avenue game were ‘on record’ with, and operated with the express permission and approval of, members and associates of certain organized crime families of La Cosa Nostra, who provided support and protection for the games and collected debts of the games in exchange for a portion of the illegal gambling proceeds,” the indictment reads.
Investigators alleged the game used professional athletes and coaches, like Billups, to lure wealthy gamblers to the game. According to the FBI, the celebrities were aware of the cheating and received a cut of the winnings.
Additionally, authorities claimed dealers were in the scheme. Game organizers used multiple methods to cheat players out of large sums of cash.
Detailing Cheating Methods
These methods included “wireless cheating technology.” The game used “off the shelf” card shufflers, which read the cards in the deck and determined which players at the table would have the best hands.
Then, that information was sent to an off-site operator. The off-site accomplice relayed the information back to a player in on the scheme through simple cell phone texts. They called the player receiving the information “the quarterback.”
Lastly, the quarterback secretly signaled other players at the table in on the scheme.
Another cheating aide included poker chip trays the read cards through a small camera. Or sometimes they went with a more traditional cheating method. Investigators said some involved used special contact lenses or glasses to read pre-marked cards, and there was an “x-ray table” that could read cards that were face down.
The New York Post reported that “decoy cellular telephones” were also used to read and analyze cards. This is similar to a high-stakes cheating ring busted last year in France.
Poker pro Matt Berkey appeared on the Pat McAfee Show Friday to shed further light on potential cheating methods.
Fish & Face Cards
Organizers referred to the victims as the “fish” and the athletes involved as “face cards.” Billups, who was playing in the NBA at the time, was allegedly one of the face cards involved. According to investigators, Billups knew the games were set up to cheat invited players.
Former NBA player and Cleveland Cavaliers assistant coach Damon Jones was also arrested as another alleged face card. But Jones was one of the few people arrested alleged to be involved in both the sports betting and poker schemes.
“What the victims, the fish, didn’t know is that everybody else at the poker game – from the dealer to the players, including the face cards – were in on the scam,” Nocella said. “Once the game was underway, the defendants fleeced the victims out of tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars per game.”
The indictment offered an example of a player getting bilked. In July 2023, a player allegedly lost $1.8 million in the Manhattan game at the Lexington Avenue location that used a rigged DeckMate shuffle machine. Most of the lost funds were allegedly distributed to those involved in the scheme, including organized crime members.
According to a Wall Street Journal report, one of the defendants texted Billups during a 2019 game in Las Vegas. He told the NBA star to lose a hand to deflect any possible suspicion.
However, another accomplice assured him that there was nothing to worry about. The second accomplice said that the player being scammed was so in awe of Billups that he “Acted like he wanted Chauncey to have his money! He was star struck!”
Threats Used To Collect $7 Million
The indictment states that since 2019, the game fleeced players out of more than $7 million. Investigators stressed that the mafia was heavily involved in backing the games and took a cut of the action.
Enforcement of debt collection often included “threats and intimidation,” and they laundered funds using multiple shell companies and cryptocurrency transfers.
“As part of the scheme, some of the defendants and their co-conspirators also committed acts of violence, including the gunpoint robbery of a person in order to obtain a rigged shuffling machine, and extortions that were perpetrated against victims in order to ensure that they repaid their gambling debts,” Nocella said.
Interestingly, one of the Manhattan homes used in the scheme was the former home of Kylie Jenner and Travis Scott. They rented the six-story townhouse in 2023. The home was even featured in an episode of The Kardashians.
Neither Jenner nor Scott were alleged to be involved in the poker scheme. But according to the New York Post, the home was the site of an interesting scenario in 2023 when rival organized crime groups held a game on the same night as another rigged game in town.
According to the report, several mobsters entered the townhouse with guns to stop the game and a brawl ensued.
Authorities arrested 31 people for their involvement in the scheme. Most defendants are from New York City and the surrounding areas. The FBI is still conducting the investigation and seeking information from anyone with knowledge of the operation.
Matt Berkey Detailed The Game In 2023
After the mainstream media publicized the arrests and the details of the case, a clip of Berkey’s Only Friends podcast resurfaced and was widely circulated on social media. In the episode, Berkey detailed his own experience with some who played in the game with Billups in 2019.
Berkey said he heard about the game from an acquaintance, who assured him that the game was “100% … on the up and up.”
In light of the Chauncey Billups arrest, we’ll just leave this here. (Ep. 277 8/21/23). @PatMcAfeeShow @PabloTorre pic.twitter.com/lZaUOY0bFb
— Only Friends Podcast (@OnlyFriends_Pod) October 23, 2025
Photo courtesy of X/Twitter
