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Dennis Atiyeh Beats Federal Rap

Atiyeh, 37, lives in Whitehall, Pennsylvania. He and his brother Joseph, 43, who lives in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, were indicted in November by the U.S. Attorney in Philadelphia. If Dennis Atiyeh was convicted, he could have been sentenced to life in prison and a fine of $7.75 million.

U.S. District Judge John R. Padova freed Joseph Atiyeh Tuesday in a directed verdict. The Atiyehs' lawyer, Ken Hense of New Jersey, told RGT Online that the judge threw that case out because it was "very very weak."

The trial began March 5 and ended Wednesday afternoon. Hense said the jury began deliberations at 9:30 this morning, asked a question about 11:45 and returned with a "not guilty" verdict at noon.

The indictment against the Atiyehs was unsealed the day before Thanksgiving. It alleged that between November 1995 and May 1996, Dennis Atiyeh used an office in Whitehall to conduct business for English Sports Betting (ESB). The authorities said that parlay cards were prepared at the office and distributed to ESB customers with a fax-on-demand service.

Other offshore bookmakers sent faxes only from their offices in the Caribbean. Today, the cards don't need to be faxed at all; they're handled online. At ESB's Web site, the parlays are available in either Acrobat Reader or Word Document format.

Hense said the parlays were prepared in Atiyeh's office in Pennsylvania. They were then sent to a company in Atlanta that converted them for access by via an 800 number. Customers of ESB would call the 800 number to get the cards faxed to them.

"They would then make their selections, after they had set up an account offshore in Jamaica," Hense said, "and fax that bet to Jamaica. The real question was if it violates Pennsylvania law, which was the government's argument, because the Pennsylvania statute says it's against the law to make, distribute, give away parlay cards.

"The jury concluded that that may be so, but this wasn't for the purpose of betting in Pennsylvania. Once that fell, they can't go on to the money laundering counts because in order to be money laundering, it has to be from the proceeds of an illegal activity. Once the jury found that there was no (Section) 1955 gambling enterprise, that ended the illegal activity."

Dennis Atiyeh also owns the Las Vegas Sporting News, a publication and Web site that promotes ESB. Former NFL quarterback Jim McMahon is a celebrity spokesman for ESB.

It's not clear whether Atiyeh's acquittal will have an impact on other prosecutions of offshore sports betting operators. Jay Cohen, the co-founder of World Sports Exchange in Antigua, was convicted in New York last year and is waiting for the start of oral arguments in his appeal.

Hense noted that the Atiyeh case was decided by a district court jury, not an appellate court. But "the public is aware that gambling should be regulated and taxed," he said.

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