Federal prosecutors alleged on Thursday that former NBA player Terry Rozier arranged a $100,000 payoff to leave a game early as part of a plan shared with bettors. Prosecutors from the Eastern District of New York filed a superseding indictment hours after co-conspirator Marves Fairley pled guilty to two charges related to the NBA wagering scandal.
Fairley told the court that he paid a player — whom the government has identified as Rozier — for the information. An initial $100,000 payout Rozier was to receive was later negotiated down to $70,000.
Rozier was charged in October with conspiracy wire fraud and money laundering. The government added sports bribery and honest services wire fraud conspiracy on Thursday. According to The Athletic, Rozier’s lawyer denied the claim and said he would pursue a motion to dismiss the case.
“The new indictment confirms that our motion to dismiss was a good one — it’s just new charges and new theories trotted out in the hope that something sticks,” Rozier attorney Jim Trusty said, perThe Athletic.
Rozier pled not guilty to the wire fraud charges in December and was released on $3 million bond. Since then Fairley is the second co-conspirator to change his plea to guilty. Damon Jones, indicted on wire fraud charges in the NBA scandal and a high-stakes poker scheme, pled guilty last month.
More than $250,000 placed in rigged bets
The new indictment also spells out details of NBAPA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement and Uniform Player Agreement, highlighting violations. The new indictment reads that the agreements “required players to ‘refrain from gambling on NBA games, point shaving or other attempts to fix the score or
outcome of an NBA game, or providing confidential team or league information to individuals
involved in gambling.'”
Rozier, then a prolific scoring guard for the Charlotte Hornets, is accused of leaving a March 23, 2023, game early due to a lingering lower leg injury. He shared the information with a friend and gambler, Deniro Laster, who in turn shared it with other gamblers, including Fairley. Laster, Fairley, and “Co-Conspirator 1,” according to court documents, discussed via text Rozier’s plan to exit early and their own plans to use that information to place bets against his statistical performance.
Fairley allegedly also shared the information with co-conspirator Shane Hennen, who in turn passed it along to a network of bettors, resulting in placement of more than $250,000 in “under” bets on Rozier for the game. In addition, two people in Rozier’s “close circle” placed $4,800 worth of bets on Rozier’s “under” totals. Not all of the bets paid, and Rozier ultimately agreed to accept $30,000 less than originally planned, according to the new indictment.
Rozier also allegedly agreed to give Laster part of the bribe.
The Hornets lost the game in question to the New Orleans Pelicans, 115-96. Rozier played 9 minutes, 34 seconds in the game and scored 5 points. During the 2022-23 season, Rozier averaged 21.1 points and 35.3 minutes of playing time per game.
In the new indictment, federal prosecutors outlined the scheme:
In exchange for an approximately $100,000 bribe, ROZIER agreed with co-conspirators, including the defendant DENIRO LASTER, Marves Fairley and Co-Conspirator 1, that ROZIER would withdraw early from a to-be-determined game purportedly on the basis of his injury so that co-conspirators could bet on the information before it became public. ROZIER also agreed to give LASTER a portion of the bribe. LASTER communicated with Fairley and Co-Conspirator 1 using encrypted applications to keep them updated as the anticipated game grew closer. Meanwhile, Fairley and the defendant
SHANE HENNEN lined up individuals who were poised to bet on the inside information once
ROZIER identified the particular game he would withdraw from.
Two other conspirators have NBA ties
About five days after the game, Fairley and Laster traveled to Philadelphia to collect payouts from Hennen for the wagers on Rozier and other “fraudulent” bets. Prosecutors allege that Rozier set up and paid for Laster’s flight. On March 29, 2023, per the filing, “Fairley gave LASTER tens of thousands of dollars in cash as payment for the non-public information that LASTER had obtained from ROZIER and had provided to Fairley regarding ROZIER’s plan to exit prematurely from the March 23 Game.”
From Philadelphia, Laster drove to Rozier’s North Carolina home, and the two counted the money. Prosecutors also detailed information gathered and fraudulent bets made on at least six other games involving co-conspirator Eric Earnest, Jones, and others.
Though all of the defendants and co-conspirators are not named in the latest indictment, Earnest, Fairley, Jones, Timothy McCormack, Long Phi Pham, and former NBA player Jontay Porter are identified. Nine others are identified only as “co-conspirators,” including one who was an NBA player and one who played in the NBA from 1997-2014 and was “an NBA coach since at least 2021.” Three others are relatives of Laster, Hennen, or Rozier.
In addition, court documents reveal that the fraudulent wagers were placed with four sportsbooks, including two that are official sports betting partners of the NBA. The league lists DraftKings and FanDuel as its “official gaming partners.”
Rozier, who was traded to the Miami Heat on Jan. 23, 2024, was placed on unpaid leave by the NBA last October due to the gambling charges. He was waived by the Heat on April 10.
