Betcha’s Continuing Legal Struggles, Updated

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer provides an update on Betcha.com’s legal problems in the states of Washington and Louisiana:

A local betting Web site entrepreneur faces possible extradition to Louisiana after authorities there charged the Seattle man with running an illegal gambling operation.

Nick Jenkins said he is awaiting Gov. Chris Gregoire’s decision on whether or not to sign the extradition release requested by Louisiana prosecutors, who say Jenkins’ now-defunct site, Betcha.com, violated federal and state laws against Internet-based gambling.

Jenkins, whose Seattle-based startup was raided by Washington State Gambling Commission investigators in early July, said his attorneys are trying to negotiate with the Governor’s Office to delay any move until his Washington state case is heard.

A status hearing on the case and possible Louisiana charges is scheduled for Wednesday morning.

Betcha.com offered internet-enabled matching of honor-based betting. Because Betcha did not accept bets or enforce payoffs, they hoped to avoid entanglement with U.S. state and federal gambling restrictions.

An earlier update was posted on Midas Oracle in August, Betcha’s Continuing Legal Struggles, and that update includes links to earlier Betcha discussion’s here. But contrary to the claim in that update, you can no longer follow Betcha’s legal problems on the Betcha blog. All posts back to July 9, about the time the Washington State Gambling Commission intervened, have been removed and no more recent posts added. (In that July 9 post Jenkins cited approvingly the efforts of Renton, WA lawyer Lee Rousso to have the state’s internet gambling law declared unconstitutional. The PI news article mentions that Rousso is now Jenkin’s attorney.)

One of the things speculated upon in some now-missing Betcha blog posts was the source of the state of Louisiana’s interest in the small Seattle-based internet start up. The article discloses that “Louisiana authorities became involved in the prosecution after a state trooper there placed a small bet as part of a joint investigation into online gambling.”