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Only Facts:

Betonsports.com was a legal and licensed sports book of the Island of Antigua.

Since the inception of the company in 1997, it operated under strict guidelines and had yearly audits and inspections by the government of Antigua.

Betonsports.com and Betus.com have nothing do with one another. Other than the fact that the founders once had shared the same beginning via another legal and licensed sports book nasasports.com.

Betonsports.com was audited and a legal corporation in another country, Costa Rica, where it moved its internet infrastructure in 1999.

Betonsports.com employed and was part of a legal offshore gambling community that employed thousands and helped improvisioned countries with a new source a income, which helped tens of thousands families.

Betonsports.com in all of its years of business never I mean 99% of the word never, stiffed a customer, the 1% that where stiffed can be categorized has wise guys or criminal clubs tring to get over on the gambling industry.

Betonsports.com in all of its years of doing business paid all its customers 99% of the time aside from wise guys or criminal clubs trying to get over on the gambling industry.

Betonsports.com operated as private business company its was legal and fully audited and was part of a global gambling community that accounted for hundreds of legal and licensed gambling companies in many countries like England, Antigua, Costa Rica, Australia, Panama, Belgium, Austria, Canada, and yes even the Untied States although the USA has never opened its doors to the free world market.

Betonsports.com gave service to Americans just like many hundreds of other companies that the American Public in the millions sought fit to consider to be legal companies operating in their country of origins.

The American public in the millions and well before betonsports.com was created used legal offshore services knowingly, breaking an antiquated law called the wire act by using companies outside their own country.

Many countries have regulated and legalized the internet and phone betting and therefore see no wrong in people of all walks and nations to entertain themselves.

Offshore companies have always tried to promote and help voice the American publics over whelming opinion that the USA should join the growing open market community by regulating and signing to law that internet gambling in the USA should be legal.

When the company went public it was fully audited by respectable companies for more than 2 years before going for IPO. Price Waterhouse and Coopers & Lybrand and Merrell Lynch, talk about getting inspected can't get better, so the chances of illegal activities where most likely improbable.

Just because Gary Kaplan got busted once early in his life has bookie, does not mean that he did not have the balls to straighten his life and create a legal fully licensed and audited company in more than 3 countries, on the contrary.

An example to this would be Mr. George Bush or Mr. Bill Clinton who did a little coke and little pot when they were young but went on to become presidents of the United States.

Betonsports.com went public in July of 2004; the private legal company became a public legal and fully audited company that was controlled by an English Board of Directors, the influences and direction of the company from this day on was by no means controlled by any of the founders.

Betonsports.com current board of directors fire CEO David Carruthers and destroy the company after July 2006 claims and arrests by United States Eastern District of Missouri.

Betonsports.com current board of directors declare them selves guilty on May 2007 of being part of and working for what they declare do be a criminal empire that was headed by the founders.

Anyone looking at the facts behind the company's rise and fall can see that there is a smear campaign going on and there are people being bought by sparing their lives from the wrath of current American's administration masterful use of a world trade issue that they want no part of and are willing to destroy whole economies and lives that get in their way.

We can not say that that millions of American consumers that use offshore gambling services are naive or criminals. We can not say that a company that is legal and audited in not one but over 3 countries for their services performed to be some criminal empire.

How much can we trust the testimony of a Board of Directors that to save their asses from stock manipulation, from not having the balls to stand up for what is legal and just in their country of citizenship, of which also let the CEO of the company without any support after the fact. The board of directors took every last penny left in the company to make their getaway, and left hundreds of loyal employees without severance pay, and left thousands of loyal customers without their deposits and winnings.

Some times you are guilty by association I find myself pondering who really are the criminals in this betonsports.com saga, the founders? The customers? The employees? Or really these people should be the one filing a plea of guilty against boards of directors who are the real criminals who betrayed co-workers, customers, employees and the world trade marketplace.

very nice points here, good job

Indeed, bostruth, those are a lot of really good points.

The BoS saga is one of those things that's going to be a case study in how -not- to be get a leg up in the online-gambling industry. The problem here is not that the current BoS management did anything wrong in the operation of the firm, but that they acquired a firm in the first place that was very likely already a target of U.S. investigations. BoS was indeed fully licensed and regulated from 2004 onward, but it's the pre-2004 period that caused the trouble.

Gary Kaplan, if my memory is correct, is originally from New York, where he had picked up a conviction for illegal bookmaking or some such long before there ever was a BetOnSports as most of us know it. There is a huge difference in the eyes of the U.S. between a foreign operation such as --- oh, a Ladbrokes, for example --- and a business that's being run by a U.S. citizen from an offshore site. Kaplan wanted to make money in the sportsbetting industry, but the U.S. has laws they selectively enforce about U.S. citizens leaving the country to do something that would be illegal outside the U.S. In the BoS indictments, I believe several small Florida-based firms were also included, allegedly providing phone relays or record-keeping services or something like that. That's an additional factor that often goes unmentioned.

As for BoS' recent plea and paying of the $500,000 fine... they were being fined $5,000 a day anyway, and they were probably just about up to $500,000 in accumulated fines, in all likelihood. So those guys sell off some stock and in exchange, they don't have to face the prospect of any criminal time in the U.S. system. That's all it is. I doubt that any additional BoS assets remain to be liquidated, anyway.

You are totally right, however, in that the U.S. wanted to snag a poster boy for bad behavior as the online-gambling war heats up, and Gary Kaplan most certainly fit that bill.