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The Eastern District of Pennsylvania US Attorney’s Office is said to be “very close” to concluding the discovery phase of its case against magazine publisher and former online gambling payment processor Don Hellinger.
“They (The US Attorney) want Hellinger bad and they are digging into his Internet gambling past to do so,” remarked a Gambling911.com source.
A handful of the companies Hellinger processed for before shutting down in 2006 still operate today, but to show the fluidity of the industry, most have ceased operating. Case in point, BetOnSports.
Hellinger, a former publisher of Nylon Magazine and Inked, was charged with the illegal distribution of over $40 million in Internet gambling winnings during the years 2005 and 2006 through a money transfer company, Payment Processing, Inc.
The US Attorney’s Office initially sought to convict Hellinger for an alleged scheme to defraud senior citizens through a telemarketing venture operating over that same time period. It was not until recently that his sojourn into online gambling came to light.
“State prosecutors, federal prosecutors and the SEC has been trying to put the (Hellinger) gang in jail for almost two decades now,” our source said.
Gambling911.com has reported extensively on what is perceived by some to be an “incestuous” legal arrangement.
Three of the attorneys in this matter simultaneously represented clients in the BetOnSports indictment out of St. Louis, Missouri, which was at the same time a civil fraud complaint was filed against Hellinger in Philadelphia, Gambling911.com is learning. One attorney in the Hellinger case, Anne Dixon, reportedly represented BetOnSports defendant Tim Brown, who was among nearly a dozen BoS executives and employees charged with violation of gambling laws. BetOnSports founder Gary Kaplan and CEO David Carruthers were charged with money laundering and tax evasion. Carruthers is currently serving the final months of his sentence in his native England after being transferred from St. Louis back in April.
“You cannot have the same attorney representing two different clients in two different, separate federal investigations for the similar offenses committed over the exact same time span,” our source noted over the summer.
There is every indication that this US Attorney wants to make an example of Don Hellinger and his associates and is prepared to do so through Hellinger’s connection with online gambling.
Any action taken against Hellinger would have zero impact on players since this payment processor has not operated for well over five years now.
- Chris Costigan, Gambling911.com Publisher
