The Southern District of New York seizing over $30 million in funds belonging to online poker players has made headlines worldwide. The plight of at least 24,000 poker enthusiasts has been documented in periodicals from the New York Times to the Baltimore Sun.
On Wednesday, Poker Players Alliance (PPA) Executive Director John Pappas appeared on Fox News debating the issue. Shortly thereafter, Poker News Daily sat down with Jeff Ifrah, attorney for several of the affected payment processors, to talk about the latest developments in this groundbreaking news story.
Poker News Daily: What was your reaction when you first heard that online poker funds were seized, as opposed to payments related to online sports betting?
Ifrah: My assumption was that there must be sports betting dollars mixed in. Every single processor that has been a target so far has processed funds for sports betting. That’s how they’ve gotten into trouble. I was surprised that the processors this time around were not.
PND: The PPA explained that due process might have been violated when the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of New York seized the funds. Do you expect a legal remedy or are both sides working toward an out of court solution?
Ifrah: The main thing we’d like to do is have a dialogue with U.S. Attorney’s Office. They’re interested in having a dialogue with us. I can’t even confirm that the U.S. Attorney’s Office understands what’s involved with the money it seized. I don’t know whether they are trying to break new ground and we hope that no lawsuit gets filed. We hope that after the dialogue, they will agree with our standpoint.
PND: Do you expect additional funds to be seized in the future?
Ifrah: I hope that the Office would take a break while they are engaged in dialogue with us. That’s going to be a process and obviously all sides are going to have to approach it with a good face. We hope that something positive will come out of it.
PND: Online poker funds were seized under the grounds that they violated the Wire Act and Illegal Gambling Business Act. Talk about why online poker is not subject to the Wire Act.
Ifrah: The Wire Act is limited to sporting events or contests. The word “sporting” has been held in the highest court that’s looked at this. It was a statute intended to stop bookmakers. Whether or not it applies to the internet is a separate issue, but it’s not our issue right now.
PND: Talk about why online poker is not subject to the Illegal Gambling Business Act. Can you give us a little bit of background on this bill?
Ifrah: The Illegal Gambling Business Act prohibits unlawful gambling as it’s defined under state law. You have to be in the business of conducting, managing, or financing an illegal gambling business and you have to be violating state law. A processor that is merely performing a trivial service like writing checks is not financing illegal gambling. On top of that, under New York state law, it’s not illegal to gamble online. We feel like payment processors are not in violation of the major criteria of the Illegal Gambling Business Act.
PND: If the online poker payment processors you represent were handling deposits instead of withdrawals, would that make any difference?
Ifrah: The folks who are on the deposit side have a completely different argument, which is that the money in an account does not represent the proceeds of illegal gambling. There is no evidence that money you deposit constitutes prior winnings. The money that is deposited came from a legitimate source.
PND: Have you received any indication as to what prompted the seizure of funds in checks and echecks in the first place?
Ifrah: The U.S. Attorney’s Office has been looking at processors involved in online sports betting for three years now. In a lot of ways, it’s possible that this isn’t new. There has been speculation that the online poker funds seizure may have been timed to coincide with the World Series of Poker.
