A World Series of Poker bracelet winner is facing up to 20 years in prison after admitting he defrauded sports bettors so desperate for what they thought was inside information that they paid him about $25 million.
Cory Zeidman, 63, who won a WSOP bracelet in a $1,500 Seven Card Stud Hi-Lo 8 or Better in 2012, plead guilty on Dec. 4, to conspiring to commit mail and wire fraud two-and-a-half years after he was indicted by the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York.
Besides facing a maximum of 20 years in jail, he also could be on the hook for forfeiture and restitution of approximately $3.6 million.
“Our company would occasionally provide potential customers with false information regarding information that our company had about various sporting events in order to induce those customers into paying fees in exchange for sports betting advice,” Zeidman told Judge Lee Dunst, according to the New York Post. “Fees the customers paid and for which I profited.”
According to the Department of Homeland Security, Zeidman and partners placed ads on radio stations around the country from 2004 to 2020 that lured victims to Zeidman for sports betting advice. They paid Zeidman millions of dollars for picks under the assumption that he had privileged information “that made betting on sporting events a no risk proposition,” according to the Feds.
“Victims were required to pay exorbitant fees to obtain this supposedly privileged information which, unbeknownst to them, was fictitious or based on the conspirators’ open-source internet research. Over the course of several years, Zeidman and his partners reaped millions in fees from victims,” the DHS wrote in a press release.
According to the indictment, Zeidman said he had access to information that wasn’t available to the pubic — things like he knew about “dirty” referees or had access to teams and knew about unannounced injuries, and even taking it so far that he knew some games were fixed.
It was all nonsense used to separate people from their money.
“As alleged, Zeidman defrauded his victims, stole their life savings and persuaded them to drain their retirement accounts to invest in his bogus sports betting group, all so he could spend it on international vacations, a multi-million dollar residence and poker tournaments,” stated United States Attorney Breon Peace in May, 2022, when Zeidman was indicted. “Today’s indictment serves as a reminder to all of us to be wary of so-called investment opportunities that purport to have inside information, as they are really a gamble not worth taking.”
While national media and several poker news outlets described Zeidman as a poker pro, that’s not the case. The Hendon Mob has his life-time earnings at $692,246 since 1997, with $373,532 of that coming in 14 cashes in WSOP events. His best cash ($201,559) came with his bracelet, and he only has one other six-figure cash from 2009.
He’ll be sentenced some time next year.
