00:00Tara Rozier and Chauncey Billups are being placed on immediate leave from their teams and will continue to cooperate with the relevant authorities.
00:06We take these allegations with the utmost seriousness and the integrity of our game remains our top priority.
00:14They have to release that statement.
00:15Not a good look yesterday, Joe, for the NBA.
00:18But also, understand this, Joe.
00:19When we saw the press conference taking place yesterday at 10 o'clock, you know, some people said, oh, they're going after the NBA.
00:25How did you detail what they said yesterday in that press conference and also the NBA releasing that statement?
00:31No, I thought they buried the headline for sure, because that was much more about organized crime than it really was about the NBA.
00:40But you're not going to get nearly the publicity and the headlines, Donnie, by framing it that way, because most people don't even think the organized crime and the mafia is still around.
00:52So, but that was one heck of a statement by them.
00:57How the NBA, I mean, they said the NBA was actually cooperating with them.
01:01That was one of the questions that they asked after the press conference.
01:05And they said the NBA has been, you know, fully cooperative.
01:08So this didn't happen 24 hours ago.
01:11This has been a work in progress for years.
01:14But it was never about the NBA.
01:17The NBA got caught up in it.
01:19This was all about the organized crime aspect of it, which happened to include now NBA players.
01:27Exactly.
01:27It's like that big fishing that you throw out there going after the big fish.
01:30You catch a lot of other fish along with that big fish here.
01:33And you go right down in those indictments.
01:35And that seems to be what happened.
01:36But we also we do have video of Cash Patel talking on the arrest from yesterday.
01:40But as you now know, individuals such as Chauncey Billups, Damon Jones and Terry Rozier were taken into custody today.
01:48Former, current NBA players and coaches.
01:51What you don't know is that this is an illegal gambling operation and sports rigging operation that spanned the course of years.
01:59The FBI led a coordinated takedown across 11 states to arrest over 30 individuals today responsible for this case, which is very much ongoing.
02:08To be clear, we're announcing today indictments in two major cases, both involving fraud.
02:16One involves sports betting and the other involves illegal gambling, very specifically rigged poker games.
02:23The first indictment involves six defendants who are alleged to have participated in one of the most brazen sports corruption schemes since online sports betting became widely legalized in the United States.
02:38This scheme is an insider sports betting conspiracy that exploited confidential information about National Basketball Association athletes and teams.
02:49The second indictment involves 31 defendants alleged to have participated in a nationwide scheme to rig illegal poker games.
03:00These defendants, which include former professional athletes, used high-tech cheating technology to steal millions of dollars from victims in underground poker games that were secretly fixed.
03:14Crazy how they went about fixing it, too, Joe, seeing some of the highlights there, you know, the glasses that they use, the contacts and, you know, the invisible ink on some of the cards.
03:24That information will come out.
03:25But make no mistake about it again.
03:27This was not a tip line, Joe.
03:28That was called three days ago.
03:29Like, hey, we're going to take a look at this.
03:30A multi-year investigation, 30-plus people taken down in this dragnet here over multiple states here.
03:37When the FBI sinks its teeth into it and the federal government gets behind it, they throw a lot of money behind these investigations here.
03:42It looks like they came up with some gems on their own.
03:46Well, and again, you have to—I think what the important part there was that this wasn't one investigation.
03:52This was two totally separate things that had overlapping participants, which is what brought it all together.
04:00So if I'm the FBI, if I'm announcing one that involves an NBA player, I might as well announce both of them at the same time, Donnie.
04:08So these weren't two separate incidents.
04:12They were investigated separately, but they were brought to us yesterday as one because, well, the same people that were involved in one of those schemes,
04:20well, they must have been involved in the other one as well, and that's how they uncovered it.
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