New detail on Absolute, Bodog, Tilt, Stars probe
Light has been shed on a four-year US federal investigation of illegal money transfer to sites including Absolute Poker, Bodog US, Full Tilt and PokerStars, US newspaper Baltimore City Paper has reported.
LIGHT has been shed on a four-year US federal investigation of illegal money transfer to sites including Absolute Poker, Bodog US, Full Tilt and PokerStars, US newspaper Baltimore City Paper has reported.
According to the newspaper, Federal authorities in the state of Maryland on 19 May filed gambling and money-laundering charges against Missouri man Kenneth Wienski, offering new insight into the wider investigation’s details, which have hitherto largely been secret because judges have granted prosecutors’ requests to seal documents supporting many of the seizures.
Wienski is accused of helping to process online gambling payment-processing by moving funds through a medical-billing company and a cheque-processing company where he worked.
The Wienski complaint goes on to describe how confidential informants have been used in the investigation, which began in 2006 shortly after passage of America’s Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA), and targeted payment processors working on behalf of operators including Absolute Poker, Bodog.com, Full Tilt and PokerStars.
One informant, referred to as CI-3, “had been personally involved in processing gambling payouts” for each of those sites, the complaint claims.