For most recent indictments and the seizure of Full Tilt Poker please read our US poker updates page.
Two Plus Two online poker forum is abuzz with rumors that minor players in the United States have been visited by Federal Bureau of Information agents, asking questions about Full Tilt Poker. According to posts on the forum, the FBI has been sniffing around players who are known to play at Full Tilt, trying to find out details about their transactions.
Those who have been approached say that they were told that they were not going to be prosecuted – the FBI agents stated that they were gathering information about the modus operandi of Full Tilt regarding its payment methods.
Speculation is high regarding the reason for this shift in gear. Many are saying that the FBI is seeking concrete evidence to lay a massive charge against Full Tilt for serving the US poker public. With the implementation of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act expected to come into effect in June, the FBI may feel that now is as ripe a time as ever to start prosecution proceedings.
Those players approached are all from the Washington area, which makes it easier for the FBI to lay a charge since online poker playing is considered a felony. As such, if players refuse to testify against Full Tilt Poker if a case is brought against them, the FBI has the ‘option’ of threatening them with legal action.
In a recent article that appeared in Forbes Magazine, the author, Nathan Vardi, questioned why no lawsuit had been brought against Full Tilt Poker and other US facing poker sites as of yet. He wrote that Full Tilt Poker is on “dangerous ground with the US government” and quoted a lawyer as saying: “There is a guerilla war going on.”
Vardi wrote that one reason why no action has been brought against Full Tilt Poker yet is that the “prosecutors figure they are better off bluffing than having to show their hands before a jury.”
On the other hand, former head of New Jersey’s Division of Gaming Enforcement, Frank Catania believes that the “federal government is not going to take any action against them because they would stand a chance of losing it.”
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