Terry Rozier Hit With Bribery Charges as the NBA Gambling Scandal Claims Its First Guilty Plea
Federal prosecutors announced new sports bribery charges against Terry Rozier on Monday, and Damon Jones became the first defendant to plead guilty.
Two developments in 48 hours have transformed what looked like a slowly moving federal case into something considerably more consequential for professional basketball.
On Monday, federal prosecutors announced they were seeking additional charges against Terry Rozier, the former Miami Heat guard already facing wire fraud and money laundering allegations. Prosecutors told the court they had developed evidence that Rozier solicited and accepted a bribe during the alleged gambling scheme, and that a superseding indictment would be filed by mid-May adding counts of sports bribery and honest services wire fraud. The announcement came, with some irony, in response to Rozier’s own motion to dismiss the existing charges. His defense team had argued the wire fraud theory was legally invalid. Prosecutors responded by adding more charges.
Then, on Tuesday morning, Damon Jones walked into Brooklyn federal court and became the first person to plead guilty.
What Damon Jones Admitted
Jones, a former NBA player and assistant coach who worked alongside LeBron James in Cleveland and Los Angeles, entered guilty pleas to two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, covering his alleged roles in the sports-betting and rigged-poker schemes.
Reading a prepared statement to the court, Jones acknowledged that he conspired with others to defraud sports betting companies by using “insider information that I obtained as a result of my relationships as a former player.” “I would like to sincerely apologize to the court, my family, my peers, and also the National Basketball Association,” he said.
The specific allegation in the sports betting case involves Jones tipping off someone close to him that a prominent Lakers player, widely understood to be James, would not play on February 9, 2023, before that information was public. James did not play that night due to an ankle injury. The game came two days after James broke the NBA’s all-time scoring record. Jones was serving as an unofficial, unpaid member of the Lakers coaching staff at the time, giving him access to injury information that the public did not have.
Why the Guilty Plea Changes Everything
A guilty plea in a federal conspiracy case is rarely just about the person entering it. Jones was one of three people charged in both the poker and sports betting schemes, and his plea comes as prosecutors continue to pursue Terry Rozier and Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups, neither of whom has shown any willingness to change their pleas.
The standard logic of federal cooperation agreements is straightforward: prosecutors offer sentencing consideration in exchange for testimony and information. Jones’s plea, accompanied by an agreement to forfeit $35,000, suggests he has given or is giving prosecutors something in return. What that something is will matter enormously for where the case goes next. If his cooperation implicates additional figures or provides evidence that strengthens the case against Rozier or Billups, the scandal that rocked the NBA’s 2025-26 season is not close to over.
The broader investigation involves 31 defendants and multiple layers of alleged activity, including the use of inside injury information to influence bets and a separate but related scheme involving high-stakes poker games that were allegedly manipulated, with Jones and Billups used as celebrity “face cards” to lure victims into playing.
The Rozier Bribery Angle
The new charges against Rozier add a dimension that was not present in the original indictment. The initial allegations alleged that Rozier tipped off his childhood friend, Deniro Laster, that he would exit a March 2023 game early, claiming an injury. Laster passed that information to a group of bettors linked to the Jontay Porter and NCAA basketball gambling scandals, who placed more than $200,000 in wagers on the under for Rozier’s player props. Rozier did leave the game after nine minutes. The original theory was that this constituted wire fraud.
The new theory is that Rozier was paid for that information. That is a materially different allegation. Wire fraud requires proving a scheme to defraud. Sports bribery is a direct charge with a cleaner evidentiary path: prosecutors need to show money changed hands in exchange for Rozier’s cooperation. If they have that evidence, as they have now told the court they do, the defense’s motion to dismiss the existing charges on legal theory grounds becomes considerably less important.
The Stakes for the League
The prosecutions of Jones, Rozier, and Billups are occurring as the sports industry grapples with problems stemming from legalized sports betting. Those problems include players taking bribes to rig prop bets, sharing insider information, and feigning injuries, as well as increased concerns over addiction and high sports betting activity among college students.
The NBA has worked aggressively with sports betting companies to generate new revenue streams since PASPA’s repeal in 2018. The league’s data partnerships and integrity fee arrangements were sold as a way to bring the industry inside a regulated framework that would protect against exactly the kind of conduct now alleged in the Eastern District of New York. Instead, the regulated market created a financial incentive structure that made insider information more valuable, not less. A prop bet on a player’s minutes, points, or rebounds is only possible in a world where those markets exist and are liquid. Rozier’s alleged scheme required both.
The next hearing is scheduled for June 10. The superseding indictment arrives in mid-May. And Damon Jones, the first man to flip, will at some point tell prosecutors everything he knows.
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