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A Long Beach, California professional poker player Damien LeForbes, who plead guilty to federal charges of money laundering and running an illegal sports betting business, will be sentenced January 23 in Los Angeles. LeForbes faces up to 15 tears in prison.
The 49-year-old LeForbes filed his guilty plea agreement in August and court documents say LeForbes cultivated his bookmaking business in a Las Vegas casino, identified in records as “Casino A.” He was a frequent player at Resorts World Las Vegas, according to informants.
The plea deal was signed by LeForbes in June and says he took millions of dollars in illegal bets over three years and recruited casino hosts to enrich his enterprise, which court documents call “the LeForbes Gambling Business.”
Famed Vegas beat reporter John L. Smith was among the first to report back in April that LeForbes was one of five gamblers and suspected bookies banned from casino properties in Las Vegas.
At the time, LeForbes attorney, David Chesnoff, urged the press and poker room parrots not to rush to judgment of his clients. He noted that getting 86’d from a casino isn’t a crime, and the attorney says he has another concern.
“If gaming companies need to know their customers that is their obligation as licensees,” Chesnoff said in a statement. “However, without findings in a court of law or in a hearing conducted with due process, they also deny people access to the non-gaming parts of the resorts, and that raises serious constitutional questions.”
Among the other bookies banned from Vegas casinos, Mattt Bowyer. He was also known as a high-roller at Resorts World Las Vegas, and somebody now cooperating with the federal investigation.
Bowyer served as a bookie for Shohei Ohtani's former translator, Ippei Mizuhara. The former translator is accused of stealing millions from Ohtani's bank account to pay gambling debts owed to illegal bookmaker Matt Bowyer.
According to court documents, the illegal operation took payments with checks, cash and payment processors and through cryptocurrency.
LeForbes live poker earnings stand at just shy of $60,000, including a win at the $ 500 No Limit Hold'em Big Poker Oktober - 2007, Los Angeles (Bell Gardens).
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