The United States Department of Justice accused a man of at least five money laundering offenses through sports betting that were handled from Costa Rica.
The authorities pointed out that it is a man from Chicago who ran the illegal sports betting business and also would have hidden the income during a bankruptcy process.
The accused man was identified with the surname Frontier, but was also known as “Ira Goldberg,” “Brian Seagal” and “Matthew Sullivan.”
According to the indictment, Frontier provided gamblers with gambling accounts at an online betting house based in Costa Rica.
The indictment also says that he paid a service fee to the bookmaker for the use of the platform, and then personally collected and paid the punters in cash. The facts investigated correspond to a period from 2010 to 2016.
He is credited with the alleged crimes of:
five money laundering charges
five charges for making a false statement in a bankruptcy case
two bankruptcy fraud charges
one charge for conducting an illegal gambling business
one charge for making a false statement before the United States Bankruptcy Court.
According to the Department of Justice, John R. Lausch, Jr., United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, participated during the investigation, as well as the FBI, and the Chicago office of the IRS Criminal Investigation Division. Similarly, the United States Trustees Program provided assistance.
The Department of Justice explained that Frontier hid his gambling income when he fraudulently obtained an order from the Bankruptcy Court of the United States.
He had a civil sentence for $1.5 million for negligence in a motorcycle accident. Frontier used the bankruptcy order obtained fraudulently and paid only $4,500.