Web Wagering Titan Loses Big
The founder of large illegal offshore sports wagering business BetonSports was sentenced to 51 months in prison on multiple charges, Acting U.S. Attorney Michael Reap announced Monday night. Gary Stephen Kaplan, 50, entered a guilty plea to charges of conspiracy to violate the racketeering statute, conspiring to violate the Wire Wager Act and violating the Wire Wager Act. He was sentenced by a federal judge in St. Louis, Mo.
As part of the plea, Kaplan forfeited to the U.S. government more than $43 million in proceeds and an additional $7 million in related earnings. Kaplan admitted that he launched an enterprise in Aruba, Antigua and eventually Costa Rica to provide sportsbook services to U.S. residents through Internet sites and toll-free phone numbers. Technologically, BetonSports phone lines terminated in Houston, Texas or Miami, Florida and were forwarded to Costa Rica by satellite transmitter or fiber-optic cable.
Kaplan's business became successful over several years and by 2004, BetonSports's principal base of operations in Costa Rica employed approximately 1,700 people. That year, BetOnSports had close to one million registered customers, accepted over 10 million sports bets in a cumulative gross amount that exceeded $1 billion. In mid-2004, Kaplan made a successful public offering of the stock of BetOnSports in the U.K. that netted him over $100 million.
"This case should serve as a warning to others who might choose to defy the laws of the United States on such a grand scale," Reap said. "Kaplan's business model itself was built on a wager that the U.S. could not and would not enforce its anti-sports book laws to reach Kaplan. Today, Kaplan lost that wager."
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