Ex-LeBron James teammate also arrested in FBI gambling probe

Several people were arrested on Thursday morning in connection with a massive FBI gambling investigation, and a former teammate of LeBron James has been charged in both cases.

Damon Jones, a former NBA guard and assistant coach, was among those who were arrested by authorities over their alleged involvement in either an illegal sports betting operation, illegal poker ring or both. Joseph Nocella Jr., the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a press conference on Thursday that the cases are separate but that Jones has been charged in both.

Jones, who played for the Cleveland Cavaliers alongside LeBron and was an assistant coach on the team’s 2016 NBA title squad, is accused of helping to perpetuate “a scheme to defraud by betting on inside, non-public information about NBA athletes and teams” between December 2022 and December 2024. Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier, who was also arrested on Thursday, is alleged to have been part of that scheme as well.

“The non-public information included when specific players would be sitting out future games, or when they would pull themselves out early for purported injuries or illnesses. They relied on corrupt individuals, including Jones and Rozier,” Nocella said Thursday. “They also misused information obtained through long-standing friendships they had with NBA players and coaches. In at least one instance, they got their information by threatening a current player, (Jontay) Porter, because of his preexisting gambling debts.

“Defendants used this non-public information to place hundreds of thousands of dollars in fraudulent bets, mostly in the form of prop bets on individual player performance. The bets were placed through online sportsbooks and also in person at casinos. The defendants relied on a network of straw bettors to place the maximum amount of bets to increase their potential profits. Most of these bets succeeded, and the intended losses were in the millions of dollars. The defendants then laundered their illegal winnings in various ways — peer-to-peer platforms, bank wires and simple cash exchanges.”

Jones has also been charged in the alleged illegal poker operation that led to Portland Trail Blazers coach Chauncey Billups being arrested. Nocella said that operation, which was aided by various Mafia organized crime families, involved targeted victims — referred to as ‘fish’ — who were invited to play in high-stakes poker games that were rigged through various methods of cheating. The participants were allegedly lured by being offered a chance to play alongside former professional athletes, including Billups and Jones.

“The defendants used a variety of very sophisticated cheating technologies, some of which were provided by other defendants in exchange for a share of the profits from the scheme. For example, they used off-the-shelf shuffling machines that had been secretly altered in order to read the cards in the deck, predict which player at the table had the best poker hand, and relay that information to an off-site operator,” Nocella said. “The off-site operator sent the information via cell phone back to a co-conspirator at the table, and that person at the table was known as the ‘quarterback.’ The ‘quarterback’ then signaled, secretly, the information he had received to others at the table and together they used that information in order to win the games and to cheat the victims.

“The defendants used other cheating technologies such as poker chip tray analyzers, which is a poker chip tray that secretly reads cards using a hidden camera, special contact lenses or eye glasses that could read pre-marked cards, and an X-ray table that could read cards face-down on the table.”

Nocella said the poker games began as early as 2019. Billups became the head coach of the Trail Blazers in 2021 and was an assistant coach with the Los Angeles Clippers for a season before that. It is unclear if he is accused of taking part in the poker games when he was employed by either team.

Jones played for several different NBA teams from 1999-2009. He was teammates with LeBron on the Cavaliers from 2005-2008. He then played professionally for a few different international teams before landing a coaching job with the Cavs in 2015.

Jones was first an assistant with the Cleveland Charge, which is the Cavaliers’ G League affiliate. He then became an assistant with the Cavs from 2016-2018 and was with the staff when James returned and led the team to an NBA title.