Paula Lavigne and Adam Rittenberg, ESPN

THE COMPUTER SCREEN showed hundreds of dots on a map, each one indicating a sports betting app in use. One cluster of dots caught the investigator’s eye. He zoomed in and saw it was the athletic facilities at the University of Iowa.

The cluster was “one of those where once you see it, you can’t unsee it,” a source with knowledge of the map told ESPN.

The legal betting age in Iowa is 21, NCAA athletes and athletic staff aren’t allowed to gamble on NCAA-sanctioned sports, and only athletes and athletic staff had access to the facility. A high volume of activity there could be “indicative of some form of potential fraud, ID theft or something,” the source said.

In May 2023, Iowa law enforcement and prosecutors, noting data showing that sportsbooks rarely flag their own bettors, acted on what Brian Sanger, an agent of the Iowa Department of Criminal Investigations, saw on that screen. The result was the nation’s first major crackdown on college athletes and gambling since a 2018 Supreme Court decision paved the way for legalized sports betting. At least 35 athletes and team support staff from Iowa and Iowa State — including football, baseball and basketball players, as well as wrestlers, notably several from Iowa’s highly ranked team — were charged criminally and/or lost all or part of their NCAA eligibility based on the information last year.

Prosecutors secured guilty pleas in all of their misdemeanor cases, but the four cases involving felony charges were dismissed when the accused questioned whether Sanger legally used betting surveillance technology. (Another case was dismissed due to a technicality.) More than two dozen athletes then filed a federal lawsuit alleging law enforcement had violated their constitutional rights by using geofencing software “illegally, and without a warrant” to identify athletes who were betting on DraftKings and FanDuel.

Sanger declined ESPN’s request for comment.

As the legal fallout continues, the Iowa case is poised to have national ramifications for how — and whether — law enforcement will be able to monitor and police illegal sports betting by athletes and how the NCAA may enforce its rules on gambling.

“It is literally an unregulated, almost completely unregulated, $2.5 billion industry,” one law enforcement source said.

“There is nothing ensuring compliance except for the sportsbooks’ pinky promise,” another added. “There’s no teeth.”

A FanDuel representative declined to comment. A DraftKings spokesperson told ESPN in a statement that the company “works closely with state gaming regulators and believes they hold operators to high standards” and is “proud to have played a role in bringing to light instances of suspicious activity.” (ESPN is a partner with Penn Entertainment, the operator of the ESPN BET sportsbook.)

Sportsbook industry executives who spoke on condition of anonymity said in an interview with ESPN that they are subject to multiple regulations, and it’s up to legislators and regulators to decide if there should be more. Enforcement is “not entirely on the sportsbooks. It’s an ecosystem,” one said, noting that the NCAA also has an obligation to better educate its athletes.

The athletes and their attorneys, meanwhile, point to what they call a vast overreach of police powers in a case that cost some of them their athletic careers.

“All it takes is an illegal investigation for you to miss out on the rest of your dreams,” former Iowa State running back Jirehl Brock said. “When your privacy was invaded and that’s the way that it happened, it puts an asterisk on the fact that we were doing it.”

ESPN spent four months reviewing emails and court filings in the case and interviewing multiple individuals close to the investigation, including attorneys, athletes, parents, school officials and Iowa criminal justice employees who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the ongoing lawsuit.

Throughout the reporting, a common thread was frustration: From law enforcement officials who feel powerless to police an exploding new industry they perceive as a threat to public health — and that is largely left to police itself — and from athletes who feel underinformed by their schools and persecuted by law enforcement they say operated outside its authority.

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David Purdum, ESPN

Banned NBA player Jontay Porter, who last week pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges related to an NBA betting scandal, is requesting permission from a federal judge to move to Greece and play basketball professionally there.

In court documents filed Tuesday in the Eastern District of New York, attorneys for Porter asked to modify his release to allow him to play for Promitheas BC in the Greek Basketball League and Champions League in Europe.

Porter is scheduled to be sentenced in New York on Dec. 18. His attorneys wrote that his overseas plans would not interfere with any of his legal obligations and that Promitheas BC officials are aware that Porter could be called back to the United States “at a moment’s notice.”

In a letter to Judge LaShann DeArcy Hall, Porter’s attorneys asked for his U.S. passport to be returned and for permission to travel in Europe and reside in Patras, Greece, with his wife and the baby they are expecting. The request is unopposed by the United States attorney’s office and the United States pretrial services officer, according to the document.

Porter would continue his treatment plan for gambling addiction while overseas, and the team is making opportunities available for in-person counseling in Greece, according to the filing.

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Mike Reiss, ESPN

The state of Louisiana has dropped the underage gambling and computer fraud charges against Kayshon Boutte, the Patriots wide receiver’s attorney confirmed to ESPN.

Boutte, 22, was arrested in January in Baton Rouge over allegations of illegal sports betting while he played at LSU. He was a full participant in spring practices earlier this year, and Patriots coach Jerod Mayo said in May regarding Boutte’s status that the organization would “wait to hear from the league going forward.”

An NFL spokesperson confirmed that the league has been following developments on the matter and that it remains under review. Boutte can continue to participate in all team activities, the spokesperson said.

Investigators assigned to the Louisiana State Police Gaming Enforcement Division found that Boutte bet on sports from April 6, 2022, until May 7, 2023, when he was 20. Boutte allegedly used an alias to get around the age requirement for placing sports wagers in Louisiana.

The alias account believed to have been used by Boutte placed more than 8,900 wagers, with at least 17 bets on NCAA football games — including at least six involving LSU, according to police.

Boutte’s wagering, according to police, continued for approximately a week after he was drafted. The NFL’s gambling policy allows players to bet on sports but not on anything related to the league.

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Wayne Parry, Associated Press

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — It might have seemed too good to be true, but there it was, and on April Fool’s Day, no less: One of the country’s leading sports books was taking bets on mixed martial arts fights that had already happened a week earlier.

FanDuel accepted 34 bets on the fights that were promoted by the sports book as live events scheduled to take place on April 1, 2022.

But the fights had actually taken place a week earlier, on March 25.

New Jersey gambling regulators fined FanDuel $2,000 for the mistake, and the company paid out over $230,000 to settle the bets.

FanDuel declined comment Wednesday on the fine, which it agreed to pay.

But the state Division of Gaming Enforcement said in a letter made public on Monday that FanDuel said it was not notified by its data-feed providers that the Professional Fighters League matches were actually a recording of events that had already happened.

Instead, FanDuel’s trading team manually created betting markets based on information they obtained directly from the Professional Fighters League, New Jersey Deputy Attorney General Gina DeAnnuntis wrote.

“FanDuel confirmed that its traders failed to confirm with PFL that the event had previously occurred and was being presented via a tape delay,” she wrote.

FanDuel told the state that on April 1, 2022, it took 26 online wagers and eight retail wagers worth $190,904 on the events.

Afterwards, FanDuel received a notification from the International Betting Integrity Association, which monitors sports betting transactions, looking for suspicious activity or out-of-the-ordinary patterns, that the events it was offering odds on had already happened.

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Associated Press, ESPN

NEW YORK — Former NBA player Jontay Porter admitted Wednesday that he schemed to take himself out of games for gambling’s sake, pleading guilty to a federal conspiracy crime in the scandal that already got him banned from the league.

“I know what I did was wrong, unlawful, and I am deeply sorry,” the former Toronto Raptors center said as he pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

Echoing findings in an NBA investigation and allegations in an ongoing prosecution of four other men, Porter acknowledged that he agreed to withdraw early from games so that co-conspirators could win bets on his performance.

He did it, he said, “to get out from under large gambling debts.”

Porter, 24, is free on $250,000 bond while awaiting sentencing set for Dec. 18.

Prosecutors estimated his sentence at a range from just under 3½ years in prison to a little over four years. Ultimately it will be up to a judge, who could impose anything from no time to 20 years behind bars. Porter also is likely to be assessed hundreds of thousands of dollars in restitution and fines.

He and his lawyer left court without speaking to reporters. The attorney, Jeff Jensen, later declined by email to comment beyond a statement he made last month, in which he said Porter “was in over his head due to a gambling addiction.”

“Jontay is a good young man with strong faith that will get him through this,” Jensen said at the time.

Porter told the court he has undergone inpatient rehab for a gambling problem and remains in therapy.

In a related case, four other men are charged with scheming to profit off tips from an NBA player that he was going to exit two games early. They or their relatives used the knowledge to place big-winning bets that the athlete would do poorly in those games, according to a court complaint filed when they were charged in June. They haven’t yet entered pleas.

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Associated Press, ESPN

NEW YORK — Former Toronto Raptors player Jontay Porter will be charged with a federal felony connected to the sports betting scandal that spurred the NBA to ban him, court papers indicate.

Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn filed what’s known as a criminal information sheet Tuesday. The document doesn’t specify a court date or the charge or charges, but it does show the case is related to an existing prosecution of four men charged with scheming to cash in on tips from a player about his plans to exit two games early.

Porter’s lawyer, Jeff Jensen, said last month that Porter had been “in over his head due to a gambling addiction” but was getting treatment and cooperating with law enforcement.

Brooklyn U.S. Attorney Breon Peace’s office declined to comment on the new developments.

An NBA investigation found in April that Porter tipped off bettors about his health and then claimed illness to exit at least one game, creating wins for anyone who had bet on him to underperform expectations. Porter also gambled on NBA games in which he didn’t play, once betting against his own team, the league said.

The four men charged last month appeared in court but haven’t yet entered pleas. They’re charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and were released on bonds in various amounts.

A court complaint against those four – Ammar Awawdeh, Timothy McCormack, Mahmud Mollah and Long Phi Pham – accused them of using prior knowledge of an NBA player’s plans so that they or their relatives could place winning bets on his performance.

The complaint identified the athlete only as “Player 1,” but details — and even a quote from an NBA news release — matched up with the league’s probe into Porter.

According to the complaint, the player owed “significant gambling debts” to Awawdeh, who encouraged the athlete to settle them with a “special”: intentionally exiting games so that bettors in the know could successfully wager on him falling short of what sportsbooks figured he’d do.

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David Purdum, ESPN

Authorities in Canada are opening a criminal investigation into the betting scandal involving former Toronto Raptors player Jontay Porter.

Craig Abrams, spokesperson for the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP), told ESPN on Tuesday that the Investigation and Enforcement Bureau determined a criminal investigation is warranted after completing an assessment of available information related to “online betting irregularities from the Jan. 26 and March 20 Raptors games.”

Four men have been charged with wire fraud by U.S. authorities in New York in connection with prop bets placed on Porter’s statistics during the Jan. 26 game against the Los Angeles Clippers and the March 20 game against the Sacramento Kings. As of Tuesday, no charges against Porter have been announced.

Abrams told ESPN in an email that OPP is aware of the ongoing investigation by U.S. federal authorities and will be connecting with them as the investigation moves forward.

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Jeff Passan, ESPN

Major League Baseball announced Friday that it has disciplined umpire Pat Hoberg for violating the league’s gambling rules, 10 days after the league levied a lifetime ban on a player for gambling and suspended four others for one year.

Hoberg is appealing the discipline and, according to ESPN sources, has denied betting on baseball. The exact nature of the discipline is unknown, but Hoberg has not umpired a game this season. MLB, in a statement, did not indicate whether its investigation into Hoberg showed that he bet on baseball.

“During this year’s Spring Training, Major League Baseball commenced an investigation regarding a potential violation of MLB’s sports betting policies by Umpire Pat Hoberg. Mr. Hoberg was removed from the field during the pendency of that investigation,” the league said in its statement. “While MLB’s investigation did not find any evidence that games worked by Mr. Hoberg were compromised or manipulated in any way, MLB determined that discipline was warranted. Mr. Hoberg has chosen to appeal that determination. Therefore, we cannot comment further until the appeal process is concluded.”

Messages left for Hoberg by ESPN earlier this week went unreturned.

“I am appealing Major League Baseball’s determination that I should be disciplined for violating the sports betting policies. While that appeal is pending, it would not be appropriate to discuss the case,” Hoberg said in a statement. “That said, I have devoted my adult life to the profession of umpiring, and the integrity of baseball is of the utmost importance to me. I look forward to the appeal process, and I am grateful that the Major League Baseball Umpires Association is supporting me in the appeal.”

If he were found to have bet on baseball, Hoberg would be in violation of MLB’s Rule 21, which punishes those who gambled on games in which they were involved with a lifetime ban and games in which they weren’t with a yearlong suspension.

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Associated Press, ESPN

NEW YORK — Two more men were charged Thursday in the sports betting scandal that prompted the NBA to ban former Toronto Raptors player Jontay Porter for life.

Timothy McCormack and Mahmud Mollah now join two other men — Long Phi Pham and a fourth whose name remains redacted in a court complaint — as defendants in a federal wire fraud case about wagers allegedly based on tips from a player about his plans to exit two games early.

Prosecutors haven’t publicly named Porter in connection with the case, but game dates and other details about the “Player 1” mentioned in the court documents match up with Porter and his April banishment from the NBA. Brooklyn federal prosecutors have declined to comment on whether the former forward is under investigation.

Current contact information could not immediately be found for Porter or any agent or other representative he may have.

An NBA investigation found in April that he tipped off bettors about his health and then claimed illness to exit at least one game and make some wagers succeed. Porter also gambled on NBA games in which he didn’t play, once betting against his own team, the league said.

Prosecutors say McCormack, Mollah, Pham and the as-yet-unknown fourth defendant took part in a scheme to get “Player 1” to take himself off the court so that they could win bets against his performance.

And win they did, with Mollah’s bets on a March 20 game netting over $1.3 million, according to the complaint. It said Pham, the player and the unnamed defendant were each supposed to get about a quarter of those winnings, and McCormack a 4% cut, before a betting company got suspicious and blocked Mollah from collecting most of the money.

McCormack also cleared more than $33,000 on a bet on a Jan. 26 game, the complaint said.

His attorney, Jeffrey Chartier, said Thursday that “no case is a slam-dunk.” He declined to comment on whether his client knows Porter.

Lawyers for Mollah and Pham have declined to comment on the allegations.

McCormack, 36, of New York, and Mollah, 24, of Lansdale, Pennsylvania, were granted $50,000 bond each after their arraignments Thursday. A judge agreed Wednesday to release Pham to home detention and electronic monitoring on $750,000 bond. The 38-year-old Brooklyn resident, who also uses the first name Bruce, remained in custody Thursday as paperwork and other details were finalized.

According to the complaint, “Player 1” amassed significant gambling debts by the beginning of 2024, and the unnamed defendant prodded him to clear his obligations by doing a “special” — their code for leaving certain games early to ensure the success of bets that he’d underperform expectations.

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Rustin Dodd, Stephen J. Nesbitt, and Cody Stavenhagen, New York Times

When Major League Baseball announced a lifetime ban for San Diego Padres infielder Tucupita Marcano on Tuesday, the particulars of his wrongdoing were laid out in specific detail: 387 bets placed at legal sportsbooks, 231 wagers related to MLB and 25 on the Pittsburgh Pirates, his employer at the time. He allegedly bet more than $150,000 on baseball.

Marcano was not a particularly savvy bettor; according to MLB, he won just 4.3 percent of his wagers, most of them parlays. But the copious facts released by the league on Tuesday —  the same day Ippei Mizuhara, Shohei Ohtani’s ex-interpreter, pleaded guilty to bank and tax fraud — underscore a recurring theme as the sports world grapples with more blowback from the precipitous rise of legalized gambling in the United States.

In a majority of states, it’s never been easier to place a bet. But in a world of legal online sportsbooks and smartphones, it’s also never been easier for leagues to track the betting and, as they see it, protect the competitive integrity of the sport. In addition to Marcano’s lifetime ban, MLB announced year-long suspensions for Oakland A’s pitcher Michael Kelly and three minor leaguers — the Padres’ Jay Groome, the Philadelphia Phillies’ José Rodríguez and the Arizona Diamondbacks’ Andrew Saalfrank. All four were found to have placed bets on MLB while in the minors.

The announcement came, according to MLB, after an investigation that included interviews and cooperation from the league’s sportsbook partners, a process that offers a window into the monitoring system in place at legal sportsbooks. That system includes outside firms like U.S. Integrity, a monitoring service that works with major sports leagues and sportsbooks.

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