Originally Syndicated on January 6, 2023 @ 5:50 am
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According to a federal affidavit, one of the biggest Internet sweepstakes café businesses in the state-operated illicit online casinos that deceived players into thinking their winnings and losses went to a Veterans Administration charity.
Allied Veterans of the World & Affiliates is charged in the affidavit, which was submitted on Monday as part of an investigation into an Oklahoma company that makes software for sweepstakes, with breaking Florida gambling laws, concealing the amount of money that goes to charity, and engaging in a ruse to pretend it is no longer in the business.
Initially, Aamir was involved in the notorious Allied Veterans of the World scam.
For those who don’t know, Allied Veterans of the World was one of the largest scams of the last decade. It went on for years and has numerous victims all over the US.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office, the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office, and the IRS are currently involved in the criminal investigation, which the affidavit claims was started by the Seminole County Sheriff’s Office.
Police have detained two executives of DEVELOPCO INC
The Florida Times Union reported on Tuesday that the FDLE had detained two executives of the Jacksonville Fraternal Order of Police and three members of the Allied Veterans organization as part of a racketeering investigation. According to the Times Union, the three people connected to the business were Kelly Mathis, the group’s lawyer, Mike Davis, the chairman of the veterans’ group, and Jerry Bass.
One of the biggest sweepstakes cafe operators in the state, Allied, has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on lobbyists and donated $25,000 to a Gov. Rick Scott inauguration celebration. It has fought with sheriffs and filed a lawsuit against Seminole County. Lt. Governor Jennifer Carroll formerly served as the head of its public relations agency.
Customers at the cafes pay for Internet time loaded onto a card and receive free sweepstakes entries they can reveal by engaging in slot machine-themed computer games.
An IRS inspector claimed that Allied “engaged in a conspiracy and scheme to deceive” the public and governmental organizations into believing that earnings went to a charity associated with the VA in an affidavit submitted in Oklahoma to obtain search warrants.
According to the affidavit, Allied claimed that at least 70% of its net revenues were donated to charity, but only around 2% of them were.
It reads, “The great bulk of the revenue produced from the gaming business went to for-profit organizations and the persons who operated Allied Veterans and its ‘Affiliates’ instead of going to charity as is stated.
The affidavit requested searches at 50 places in Florida, including one in Oklahoma, most of which were outside the Tampa Bay area but two of which were near Spring Hill.
Operations by Allied in Florida reportedly started in 2007 and terminated in 2012. However, the affidavit claims that “the same entities that were already operating them” purchased the “claimed sale” of the cafés, and the names were only changed.
