Worst of all, the plan didn’t even work. DraftKings noted that the unders on Jontay’s stats were the most profitable bet of the whole night, a surprise for such a small-time player. But Awawdeh said that, because of spending limits that they hadn’t anticipated, they couldn’t put enough money down to clear Jontay’s debt. They pressed him to do it again. For weeks, Jontay resisted.
By that time, Awawdeh had put Jontay in touch by text with a guy named Vinny, whom Jontay understood to be a bookie for the Italian Mafia. Soon, Jontay owed Vinny some two hundred thousand dollars. According to Jontay, Awawdeh warned that Vinny had just been released from prison for manslaughter, and “didn’t take kindly to people who crossed him.” One gambler who hadn’t paid his debt, Awawdeh told him, was tied to a chair in a warehouse and had his finger cut off before giving up his crypto wallet. (Awawdeh denies saying this.) Jontay said that, at one point, he received a threat that enforcers would pay Kelli a visit in Toronto. “I guess that was my weak spot,” he said. Kelli had recently told him that she was pregnant, and Jontay didn’t want to bring a child into the world with a gambling debt to the Mob hanging over his head.
In March, 2024, Jontay pulled himself out of a game against the Sacramento Kings, saying that he felt sick. Meanwhile, Awawdeh went with Pham, their friend Timothy McCormack, and a friend of Jontay’s named Mahmud Mollah to a brick-and-mortar DraftKings location in Atlantic City. According to prosecutors, surveillance footage shows them approaching the casino cage with a blue gift bag full of cash and handing the money to a teller. They made at least seven parlays against Jontay’s stats, which would have paid out for more than a million dollars.
Instead, the bets were immediately flagged. Sportsbooks track bets in real time and use algorithms to spot suspicious activity. A huge parlay on LeBron James would earn a second look. One on Jontay Porter, a little-known reserve, might as well have been a confession. The minute Jontay took himself out of the game, a digital dye pack exploded all over their cash. (FanDuel and DraftKings, unlike illegal operators, can accept suspicious bets because if a bet loses they can keep the money, and if it wins they can notify law enforcement and will likely never have to pay out.) Jontay didn’t know it at the time, but the plan had also been leaked to other co-conspirators. Similar bets had been placed on several other sportsbooks. DraftKings reported the activity. (Mollah, Pham, and McCormack have all pleaded guilty to wire-fraud charges.)
A few days later, while taking a pre-game nap in a hotel suite, Jontay got a call from the Raptors’ general manager, who told him that he was under investigation for “suspicious betting activity.” “I knew I was toast,” he said.
He was soon banned from the N.B.A. Kelli considered divorcing him. Jontay Googled whether or not he could still go to Heaven if he killed himself. He bought a gun. “There was one incident where I—I don’t even think my wife knows this—but I held it to my head and I was just crying: ‘I can’t do this anymore,’ ” he said. Gambling has the highest suicide rate of any addiction; nearly twenty per cent of addicts attempt to take their own lives. But, as he thought about pulling the trigger, he imagined his unborn son. “I can’t leave this earth without meeting him,” he said.
