A reputed mobster, who was as soon as accused of beating his porn star ex-girlfriend, is charged within the FBI’s sweeping investigation right into a multi-million greenback rigged poker ring that included former NBA gamers, based on officers.
Thomas Gelardo — an alleged affiliate of the Bonanno and Genovese Crime Households referred to as “Tommy Juice” — acted as muscle within the video games, threatening victims to repay their money owed after they had been ripped off within the poker video games, the federal indictment mentioned.
Tommy Juice was paid a portion of the proceeds, which he kicked up the chain to his mob bosses, prosecutors alleged.
Previous to his playing bust, he whined about being stored behind bars too lengthy after he cashed his grownup mannequin ex, Trista Geyer, stage title Kendall Brooks, after he was arrested in 2013 for allegedly beating her after which repeatedly ignoring a restraining order.
The prices had been dismissed in 2016 after the “Naughty Athletics” and “Housewives Want Money 5″ star claimed she couldn’t present up for the trial due to a “sick member of the family.”
For the poker scheme, Gelardo allegedly labored on behalf of the Bonannos making collections from the video games, which came about in Manhattan, the Hamptons and Las Vegas, based on the federal indictment unsealed on Thursday.
Observe The Submit’s newest on the playing scandal rocking the NBA:
The feds charged 31 individuals — together with Portland Trailblazer head coach Chauncey Billups and former NBA participant Damon Jones.
The Scarsdale, New York native, additionally acquired a portion of the loot obtained from a “rigged shuffling machine” at one of many unlawful video games on Lexington Avenue in Manhattan in 2023, the indictment states.
And between November 2022 and February 2023 Gelardo and others additionally extorted an unidentified sufferer, based on the doc.
The scheme, based on prosecutors, was to lure unsuspecting victims, or “fish,” to play high-stakes poker video games alongside former athletes like Billups and Jones, recognized within the ring as “face playing cards.”
The video games had been mounted in the home’s favor utilizing subtle tech, together with rigged card shufflers, X-ray tables and particular glasses and phone lenses, prosecutors mentioned.
“What the victims, the fish, didn’t know is that everyone else on the poker recreation, from the vendor to the gamers, together with the face playing cards, had been in on the rip-off. As soon as the sport was underway, the defendants fleeced the victims out of tens or lots of of 1000’s of {dollars} per recreation,” Joseph Nocella Jr., the U.S. legal professional for the Japanese District of New York.
Gelardo and others shake down the victims for the soiled cash, which might then be laundered.
