Former Lakers assistant Damon Jones pleads guilty in gambling probe
Former Lakers assistant coach Damon Jones became the first among 34 defendants to plead guilty Tuesday in an expansive gambling indictment that also ensnared Hall of Fame player Chauncey Billups, Miami Heat star Terry Rozier and organized crime figures.
Jones was a Lakers coach in 2022 and 2023, long after he retired from an 11-year NBA playing career with 11 teams. Before a Feb. 9, 2023, game between the Lakers and Milwaukee Bucks in which LeBron James was a late scratch because of a foot injury, evidence showed that Jones urged a co-conspirator to “get a big bet on Milwaukee before the information is out!”
Jones urged his co-conspirator in a text: “Bet enough so Djones can eat to [sic] now!!!”
Jones and James were considered good friends for years. A person close to James told The Times in October that the Lakers star didn’t know that Jones was selling injury information to gamblers placing bets.
Jones had entered not guilty pleas in November to the two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud for his role in sports betting and rigged poker game schemes. However, during back-to-back hearings in Brooklyn federal court Tuesday, he entered guilty pleas to those charges.
Sentencing is scheduled for Jan. 6 before separate judges in the two cases. Guidelines call for 21 to 27 months in prison for the sports gambling charge and 63 to 78 months for the charge on rigged poker games. Prosecutors said they agreed to shave 15 months from the sentence in exchange for Jones pleading guilty by April 30.
He pleaded guilty in the sports betting case first. In a prepared statement, he 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.”
Jones, 49, said the goal of the sports betting conspiracy was to use his insider knowledge of injuries to players to make money gambling.
“I would like to sincerely apologize to the court, my family, my peers and also the National Basketball Association,” said Jones, who was paid $21 million as a player.
Next came pleading guilty to participating in rigged poker games. Jones admitted that he was paid to use his NBA celebrity to lure deep-pocketed gamblers to poker games in Miami and New York.
Again reading from a statement, Jones said that, based on conversations with his co-conspirators at poker games, “I knew these games were rigged and that players were being cheated.”
And again he concluded with an apology, addressing the court, his family and friends.
“I’m really sorry to everyone involved for my actions,” he said.
Prosecutors said Monday they would seek additional charges against Rozier in the sports betting case because they had developed evidence that the 10-year NBA veteran solicited a bribe during an alleged gambling scheme.
According to the original indictment, when Rozier played for the Charlotte Hornets in 2023, he told friends he was planning to leave a game early with a “supposed injury,” allowing others to place wagers. Rozier has made $135 million as a player.
Billups, who played with the Clippers for two seasons and later was a member of Clippers coach Ty Lue’s staff before being named head coach of the Portland Trail Blazers in 2021, is charged with rigging underground poker games that authorities said were backed by three of New York’s Mafia families. Billups, who was inducted into the Naismith Hall of Fame in 2024, made $107 million as a player.