Professional poker player Damien LeForbes, a customer at Resorts World and a number of Las Vegas casinos, agreed Monday to a federal plea deal for money laundering and operating an illegal gambling business. He faces up to 15 years in prison and a fine of $500,000 or twice the gross gain or loss resulting from the offenses.
The plea agreement says from January 2022 through December 15, 2023, LeForbes gambled $148 million at Casino A.
It’s unknown if Casino A is Resorts World, where LeForbes racked up $12.3 million in losses during close to four dozen trips, as reported by the Current in May.
Earlier this month, the Nevada Gaming Control Board filed a complaint against Resorts World for allowing illegal bookie Matt Bowyer and other gamblers to bet, despite their lack of a credible source of funds. Among four gamblers cited in the GCB complaint is Patron A, “an unnamed individual suspected of being an illegal bookmaker.”
The GCB complaint stated Patron A, who told his Resorts World host that he was a bookie, lost $10 million at Resorts World between September 2022 and December 2023, and gambled 150 separate days during that period.
“In some instances, Defendant recruited casino hosts to be agents of the LeForbes Gambling Business,” according to the federal plea agreement. “This included at least two hosts at Casino A, who referred at least two new potential bettors” to LeForbes.
From Oct. 1, 2021 through Dec. 22, 2023 “defendant executed at least 17 personal or cashier’s checks to Casino A, totalling at least $9,105,000” from a bank account used to conduct the illegal gambling ring. LeForbes also paid Casino A at least $2.8 million in cash.
LeForbes paid bettors in chips from Casino A, and at one point texted another illegal bookie “(Casino A) is most important because the chips are so versatile for me.”
LeForbes also used cryptocurrency wallets to receive payment from bettors and pay them, and instructed bettors on how to avoid detection, the plea agreement says.
“I’d just send like $100,000 at a time to different addresses,” he told a bettor who voiced concerns via text. “You can create a different address in a wallet every time [.] Just don’t send to an exchange [.] Wallets are fine though… Just remember fresh address [.] No exchanges [.] I do it every week for millions back and forth [.]”
The government, which seized millions of dollars from LeForbes’ California home during a December 2023 raid, agreed not to seek forfeiture of $249,000 in cash as well as 5000 Chainlink digital currency coins – worth $11.32 a coin as of Wednesday.
A casino record obtained by the Current reveals Resorts World turned over a bad check earlier this year for $2.5 million from LeForbes to the Clark County District Attorney for prosecution, however, no case has been filed against the gambler.
His Las Vegas attorney, David Chesnoff, declined to comment. District Attorney Steve Wolfson did not respond to requests for comment.
LeForbes also owes $1 million to the Venetian, according to a source at that casino. That marker has also been sent to the district attorney, according to the source, however no case has been filed.
The Current was first to report last year on the federal probe out of California into money laundering at Las Vegas casinos.
Scott Sibella, the former president of Resorts World, who was terminated weeks after the story broke, entered a plea deal with the feds for allowing illegal bookie Wayne Nix to pay more than $100,000 in cash to MGM Grand toward a gambling debt without filing a suspicious activity report, as required by federal law.
MGM Grand and the Cosmopolitan have since entered into non-prosecution agreements with the government and paid a $7.45 million fine. Resorts World has not been charged by the federal government with wrongdoing.
