Phil Ivey, Howard Lederer and other Full Tilt Pros to Jail?
Written by Renee K | Tuesday, April 6th, 2010
The hottest news on the poker circuit is that a grand jury in Manhattan is set to investigate leading online poker site, Full Tilt Poker on charges on money laundering and the breaking of online gambling laws.
The news was first put forth by the Financial Times of London and quickly picked up by many major news sources across the internet. According to the Financial Times, the investigation “could bring indictments against some of the world’s best know professional players.”
Just as a reminder, Full Tilt Poker has the names of some of the industry’s top players linked to it, including Phil Ivey, Howard Lederer and Chris Ferguson.
Authorities are pushing for money laundering charges against the online poker site, according to the publication, explaining: “Money laundering charges might be attractive to the government as they would compel coordination from authorities even in countries where gambling is legal.”
Nobody was quite ready to comment on the speculations written in the Financial Times. Attorneys for Ferguson and Lederer declined to speak and said that they were not going to comment “about a speculative jury investigation that we are not aware of.”
It is believed that authorities have been gathering information against Full Tilt Poker for some time now, although nobody has been rushing into laying any charges just yet due to the ambiguity of the US laws and the ever-prevalent question of whether poker is a game of skill or chance.
Industry experts believe that the current Grand Jury investigation – if this indeed proves to be the case – is just another example of intimidation by the US authorities in the hope of bringing online gambling and poker to their knees. However, with US facing sites generating around $1 billion each year, it seems that these efforts are fruitless.
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· Written by Renee K · Filed Under Poker News · Comments Off
