Now they have really done it........

[Point_Given_Gal]

From the BLOODHORSE.

Justice Department, FBI Join Pick Six Probe
by Lenny Shulman
Date Posted: 11/8/02 4:09:12 PM
Last Updated: 11/8/02 4:17:50 PM

 
In a dramatic expansion in the investigation into the alleged fixing of a winning Pick Six ticket during the World Thoroughbred Championships Breeders\' Cup Oct. 26, the U.S. Justice Department, through federal prosecutors in Manhattan, along with the FBI, have joined the effort to see if criminal activity was involved.
United States Attorney for the Southern District in New York, James B. Comey, released the following statement Friday afternoon: \"At the request of the New York State Police, this office, along with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, is assisting in this matter.\"

The U.S. Attorney\'s office is part of the federal Justice Department. Because the alleged wire fraud involves various states, it falls under the jurisdiction of FBI involvement.

[TGJB]

This is just the beginning, and \"the industry\" is being really stupid if they don\'t get in front of this right away. If I\'m right, RICO statutes are going to apply, meaning those involved are going to be looking at huge jail time, and are going to be anxious to talk. Mall is right-- someone could end up in the trunk of a car before this is over. If not, an awful lot of previous past-posts could end up being revealed. As some in the industry know, I\'ve been screaming about this since the 01 Fla. Derby, and I don\'t think it\'s confined to multiple race wagers. They should start by looking at all bets made at the North Dakota site where the \"whale\" made his huge bets--
if there was actually an individual bettor. The site itself, WHICH HAD DIRECT ACCESS TO THE POOLS, would be where I would begin-- if you recall, the story at the time was that the \"bettor\" had a sophisticated system which required knowing exactly how much was in each pool. HE WAS IN-- how hard would it have been to change the time codes on the bets?

The story at the time was that the \"guy\" had made 28% on handle over 2 years at Gulfstream. Prior to rebates, top pros worked on about 2 to 3%, and in the best year I ever had-- which made some bookmakers very unhappy-- I made 10%. This was without the money going into the pools and hurting my prices-- the \"whale\" was betting huge amounts of money, and personally cut Monarchos from 5/2 to 7/5. I will be forever convinced that bet was made at the eigth pole.

[derby1592]

I hope they really dig deep and audit all the systems going back at least a few years looking for tampering and that they track down as many leads as possible. As many of us have been saying all along, it is crazy to think this is an \"isolated incident,\" which seems to be the popular spin at the moment.

I don\'t expect the problem to be fixed overnight but I want them to really dig deep; far beyond this particular incident and beyond this particular group of criminals.

Chris

[MO]

So do I. But nothing ever came of the Erica Betia murder nor the Pedro Ortega murder, nor the Thunder Gulch buzzer incident, nor the \"amazing move\" by Macho Uno at Suffolk, nor the $24 payoff on my $60 post time exacta this summer, to name just a handful of crimes commited in this game because of blind stewards and the \"kentucky good ole boys\" who control this game.

I have retired from betting. Did not pay any attention to this year\'s Breeders\' Cup except to see how much coverage the drunk bugler got (one race- imaging my surprise!)

I wish I could say I am glad I don\'t play anymore, but I am not. My heart goes out to all who got screwed on racings biggest day. And you know what? Less than 10% of the population plays this game and thats why you will not hear about this or other crimes in racing on the 6 o\'clock news. And you never will. Why? Because the good ole boys know its bad for racings image. Imagine my surprise.
MO

[ExPlayer]

  The latest from Beyer suggests that this kind of \'pool scalping\' may have  been going on for some time. Hey, they stole many billions from the public on Wall Street and there are a lot more folks watching there than at the races.

  I have no doubt that others have pulled off this scam and gotten away with it. Just as I have even less doubt that sophisticated bettors at large tracks routinely \'scalp\' the pool with *negative* information purchased or self-generated (ie, owners).

  All of this + a confiscitory takeout make the game a struggle for even the best players. That it can still be beaten is a testimony to that skill.

[Mall]

As you know, I disagree on the Fla Derby, both because Beyer was given unfettered access to the records and because the incident was investigated at the time. In my humble opinion, that incident is similar to the April mdn race at Hol where the horse\'s odds dropped from 9/2 to 2-5 while the race was in progress as a result of a $118,000 last second bet that went through the Lewiston,Me hub. In both cases, large & stupid bets made by a person or persons who do not understand the basics of parimutuel wagering. If you have a system which updates the odds on a 30 or 45 second cycle(60 secs when the Fla Derby bet was made), and ten times as much is bet off track as on, & win pools which aren\'t as big as exotic pools, you are going to have early speed favs whose odds seem to drop while the race is in progress. As I\'ve said before, no one seems to remember all the times when the odds dropped & the horse lost, and those that thought they had a 5-1 shot were happy to learn that the horse\'s odds increased to 7-1 while the race was in progress. I saw it & in some cases benefitted from it at FG & Kee during the yrs when it was happening more frequently, and was actively looking for the tracks where the so called Whale was playing. The 28% number was never verified, and as I have said many times, there have been any number of people who have shown impressive returns using mathematical and other formulas over short periods of time. Talk to me after 5 or 10 yrs. Where is the Dakota whiz today?


Whether I\'m right about this does not really matter in the current atmosphere, where perception means every bit as much as reality, which explains why betting at CD tracks is now going to close one min before post. What I think we\'ll see is late drops in odds which everyone will know about before the gates open. In some cases( I\'m going to go out on a limb here and say about 33% of cases) we\'ll see a horse, maybe even a horse that wires the field, win after the odds have dropped precipitiously in the last minute. In other cases such horses will lose. If I\'m right, no doubt there will be many explanations of why this shows that certain of these races were fixed.

To show that I\'m a fair minded guy, I copied the following paragraph from a much longer piece on some of the ironic aspects of what has happened:

\"Ironic, isn\'t it, that the web site of the other tote company, Amtote, includes a description of what it was like in the roaring twenties, \'a decade of rampant corruption, unscrupulous gambling operations and quintessential greed.\' It was one particularly galling incident which caused a young engineer to start a company which was supposed to restore integrity to racing. What upset Harry Straus so much was that he had made a large bet on a longshot in the last race at a Md track in 1927 at posted odds of 12-1. The horse won, but the payoff was a \'mere 4-1.\' Sound familiar?\"