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On Wednesday afternoon, the famously operating gambling site PokerStars’ founder Isai Scheinberg pled guilty charges for operating an illegal online gambling business. The guilty plea was addressed in a New York federal court. It was initiated two months after the 73-year -old duel citizen of Canada and Israel originally surrendered to U.S. authorities. The founder Isai was released on $ 1 million bail after initially pleading not guilty to all charges.
But now with the circumstances not moving in favours, he had plead guilty to one count of operating an illegal gambling business Scheinberg is now facing up to five years behind bars.
The Department of Justice has issued a press released, in which Congress is recommending the maximum penalty. In this case, Scheinberg case and punishment will be decided by Judge A. Kapan at a later date.
Ten other executives of other major online poker rooms along with Scheinberg were charged with bank fraud, money laundering and illegal gambling in April 2011 on what the poker industry refers to as “Black Friday.” The other has also pleaded for guilty.
All the domain names and funds of online poker rooms have been sealed. They were all still operating in the U.S. after the 2006 passage of the Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act.
Now even though the prison time recommended by Congress, it is still very unlikely that Scheinberg spends time incarcerated. The Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman in a press release said that “Ten years ago, this Office charged 11 defendants who operated, or provided fraudulent payment processing services to, three of the largest online poker companies then operating in the United States- PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker, and Absolute Poker- with operating illegal gambling businesses and other crimes.”
PokerStar was founded by Scheinberg its owner ad continued to work in the legal grey area that existed in the United States after 2006. However, Scheinberg sold the company in 2014 to Amaya for $4.9 billion. Since then, the company has partially operated in the U.S. market and regulated in New Jersey and Pennsylvania markets.