Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups, a Denver native and former basketball star at the University of Colorado and with the Denver Nuggets, allegedly participated in a years-long scheme to rig Mafia-led poker games through sophisticated technological means, scamming wealthy players out of millions of dollars, according to a sweeping federal indictment unsealed Thursday.
Billups was arrested Thursday in Oregon and faces federal charges of wire fraud conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy. He’s expected to make an initial court appearance later Thursday. The NBA said the 49-year-old coach would be placed on immediate leave.
The arrest came as part of a massive federal investigation into illegal, high-stakes poker games with ties to organized crime families. A second, related criminal case involved professional basketball players and coaches allegedly using inside information to set up fraudulent bets for their associates.
The 22-page indictment, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, alleges the poker games began as early as 2019 and spanned New York state, Las Vegas and Miami.
Victims of the scheme thought they were playing in “straight” illegal poker games, according to the indictment.
In reality, a group of people — referred to as the “cheating team” — worked together to scam them out of millions, investigators said.
They used a variety of high-tech methods to rig the games, federal authorities alleged. Wireless technologies to read the cards dealt in each hand. Rigged shuffling machines. Electronic poker chip trays that could secretly read cards placed on the table. Card analyzers that could surreptitiously detect which cards were on the table. Playing cards that had markers visible only to people wearing specially designed contact lenses or glasses.
Billups, investigators allege, was known as a “face card.” He and other former professional athletes were used to attract victims to the poker games. In exchange, they received portions of the criminal proceeds, authorities said.
The indictment spells out one game in April 2019, in Las Vegas, when the group defrauded poker players of at least $50,000. Billups, along with four others, “organized and participated in these rigged games using a rigged shuffling machine,” according to the indictment.
Authorities say the games operated “with the express permission and approval of” members of certain organized crime families of La Cosa Nostra. These individuals — with nicknames like “Spanish G, “Flapper Poker”, “Sugar” and “Albanian Bruce” — provided support and protection for the games and collected debts in exchange for a portion of the illegal proceeds
Authorities say the organized crime families used “threats of force and violence” to secure repayment of debts from these poker games.
All told, the poker scheme defrauded participants of at least $7.15 million, investigators said.
“Using the allure of high-stakes winnings and the promise to play alongside well-known professional athletes, these defendants allegedly defrauded unwitting victims out of tens of millions of dollars and established a financial pipeline to La Cosa Nostra,” FBI Assistant Director in Charge Christopher G. Raia said in a statement. “This alleged scheme wreaked havoc across the nation, exploiting the notoriety of some and the wallets of others to finance the Italian crime families.”
Thursday’s indictment and arrests, Joseph Nocella, Jr., United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York said, “sounds the final buzzer for these cheaters.”
The second criminal case involved NBA players and coaches divulging nonpublic information to their associates for the purpose of placing bets.
The 23-page indictment does not name Billups, but does list nine unnamed co-conspirators, including an Oregon resident who was an NBA player from about 1997 to 2014 and an NBA coach since at least 2021. Billups played in the NBA from 1997 to 2014 and was hired by the Blazers in 2021.
That individual, referred to as “co-conspirator 8,” allegedly told a bettor that several of the Blazers’ best players would be sitting out a March 23, 2023, game against the Chicago Bulls in order to increase their odds of getting a better draft pick.
The gamblers wagered more than $100,000 that Portland would lose the game. The Blazers lost by 28.
Billups was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame last year. The five-time All-Star and three-time All-NBA point guard led the Detroit Pistons to their third league title in 2004 as NBA Finals MVP.
The Denver-born phenom graduated from George Washington High School and played basketball at CU before being selected with the No. 3 overall pick in the 1997 NBA draft by the Boston Celtics.
Known as Mr. Big Shot nationally and the King of Park Hill locally in Denver, Billups also played for Toronto, Denver, Minnesota, the New York Knicks and the Los Angeles Clippers. Billups won the Joe Dumars Trophy, the NBA’s sportsmanship award, in 2009 while playing for his hometown Nuggets.
Billups is in his fifth season as Portland’s coach, compiling a 117-212 record. The Trail Blazers opened the season Wednesday night at home with a 118-114 loss to Minnesota. Billups’ brother, Rodney, is currently the Nuggets’ director of player development and an assistant coach on David Adelman’s staff.
The Portland coach also serves as executive director of the Porter-Billups Leadership Academy, a summer program affiliated with Denver’s Regis University. The academy helps third through 12th-graders “cultivate character development through an extensive academic curriculum and exposes young leaders to career opportunities in their pursuit of individual success.”
Academy representatives said in a statement that they are “deeply troubled by the indictment against Chauncey Billups, co-founder of the Porter Billups Leadership Academy. We respect the legal process and will closely monitor developments as the facts emerge. Our unwavering commitment to the underserved youths through the PBLA program and our institutional integrity remains steadfast.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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