Written by :
Published on :
Brent Beckley, one of about a dozen men indicted on April 15, 2011, charged with bank fraud and money laundering in connection with running online poker sites, will face sentencing on June 28 at 2:30 pm EST (This will be on a Thursday).
The sentence was to be handed down on May 21, 2012 but was rescheduled once again.
Beckley was charged in connection with his running the UB.com online poker room and its sister site Absolute Poker. Another UB.com executive named in the US Justice Department complaint, Scott Tom, was charged with a lesser offense of violating a gambling act, in this case the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA).
Since those charges were filed, the US Justice Department has reversed its stance on applying poker to previous prohibition, the Federal Wire Act, put on the books in 1961.
BRENT BECKLEY, ------------------------------------------x
ORDER
LEWIS A. KAPLAN, District Judge.
The Court hereby notifies the parties that it intends to consider an upward departure under USSG § 5K2.0 on the ground that there is an aggravating circumstance in this case of a kind, or to a degree, not adequately taken into consideration by the Sentencing Commission in formulating the guidelines. Specifically, the applicable guideline, USSG § 2B1.1, depends heavily on the loss amount, which is defined in terms of "the reasonably foreseeable pecuniary harm," id. App. Note 3(A). Here the government acknowledges that it is not in a position to establish pecuniary harm in view of the nature of the offenses of conviction. But, as the Presentence Report and, to an extent, the defendant's allocation, make plain, the defendant deliberately and unlawfully conspired to circumvent, and circumvented, governing laws of the United States in order to conduct or facilitate an unlawful business or businesses involving billions of dollars from which those businesses gained many millions of dollars. The failure of the guideline so heavily dependent on loss amount to fix an appropriate sentencing range in a case like this may warrant an upward departure. See, e.g., United States v. Spiegelman, 4 F. Supp.2d 275,287-92 (S.D.N.Y. 1998); USSG § 2B1.1, App. Note 19(A).
In the circumstances, the sentencing previously scheduled for May 21, 2012 is adjourned until June 28,2012 at 2:30 p.m. Any submission on behalfofthe defendant with respect to the proposed departureshallbefilednolaterthanJune8,2012. Anysubmissiononbehalfofthegovernmentshallbe filed no later than June 18,2012. Any reply submission by the defendant shall be filed no later than June 25,2012.
- Ace King, Gambling911.com
