| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| PartyT |
Posted - 04/16/2011 : 03:18:07 AM
U.S.Government Moves To Shut Down World’s Biggest Online Poker Companies
Federal prosecutors today unsealed a sweeping indictment against Isai Scheinberg and Raymond Bitar, founders of the world’s biggest online poker companies, and moved to try to shut down their businesses.
The indictment filed by Preet Bharara, the U.S. Attorney in Manhattan, charges Scheinberg, the founder of PokerStars, and Bitar, the founder of Full Tilt Poker, as well as nine other individuals, accusing them of operating illegal gambling businesses. Federal prosecutors also filed a civil lawsuit seeking $3 billion in civil money laundering penalties, alleging the online poker companies disguised money they received from U.S. poker players as payments to online merchants selling jewelry and golf balls.
The U.S. Attorney in Manhattan moved to try to shut down the online poker business in America by seizing five Internet domain names, including pokerstars.com and fulltiltpoker.com, used by the three main companies facilitating online poker games in the U.S. In addition, a federal judge issued a restraining order against 76 bank accounts in 14 countries utilized by those online poker firms.
The indictment sets up a complicated global legal battle between the Department of Justice and the online poker entrepreneurs who have long argued that their operations in the U.S. do not violate U.S. law. Indeed, in recent days, one of the nation’s most prominent casino billionaires, Steve Wynn, announced a strategic relationship with PokerStars and said “in the United States of America the Justice Department has an opinion but several states have ruled and courts have agreed that poker is a game of skill, it’s not gambling. PokerStars rests their argument on that.”
THE JUNGLE
Nathan Vardi
[url]http://blogs.forbes.com/nathanvardi/[/url] |
| 1 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| PartyT |
Posted - 04/17/2011 : 06:46:28 AM
FBI seizes major poker domains
The domain names of three of the largest online poker rooms
that accept U.S. players have been seized by the FBI and shut down in the U.S., several sources are reporting.
PokerStars.com, FullTiltPoker.com, UB.com and Absolute Poker |
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