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Dave McMenamin
Former 11-year NBA player Damon Jones was arrested Thursday amid charges that he allegedly disclosed privileged injury information about a “prominent” basketball player to facilitate illegal sports betting, authorities announced.
LeBron James was the prominent player, a source close to James told ESPN.
James was not accused of wrongdoing in the indictment.
Jones was one of 34 people arrested, along with Portland Trail Blazers coach Chauncey Billups and Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier, as part of a yearslong investigation spanning nearly a dozen states and involving tens of millions of dollars, FBI director Kash Patel said.
The investigation outlined two separate cases — one on illegal sports betting and another on rigged poker games involving the Mafia, authorities announced.
Jones was an unofficial, unpaid part of former Los Angeles Lakers coach Darvin Ham’s staff and is no longer with the team under current Lakers coach JJ Redick. Ham invited Jones to be a part of team activities after James spent the summer of 2022 with Jones present for many of his offseason workouts.
James was unaware that Jones, his former teammate and assistant coach with the Cleveland Cavaliers, was involved in gambling activity when Jones spent time around James and the Lakers during the 2022-23 season, the source said. The federal indictment alleges that before a Lakers game against the Milwaukee Bucks on Feb. 9, 2023, Jones texted a co-conspirator to “get a big bet on Milwaukee tonight” because James was going to be out.
James, who passed Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the NBA’s all-time leading scorer in the previous game on Feb. 7, 2023, would go on to miss three straight games because of soreness in his left ankle.
Jones allegedly added via text: “Bet enough so Djones can eat [too] now!!!”
Without James, Milwaukee beat the Lakers 115-106.
Additionally, the indictment alleges that the following season Jones provided nonpublic information to a co-conspirator in connection to the Lakers’ game against the Oklahoma City Thunder on Jan. 15, 2024.
The Lakers had no comment on the allegations against Jones when reached by ESPN on Thursday morning.
Speaking after practice on Thursday, Redick said the league’s anti-gambling rules have been reiterated to his team this season — independent of the FBI’s investigation.
“We’ve had two meetings on it already,” Redick said. “It’s obviously on the front of everyone’s awareness given the last two years, but other than that, there’s no other comment.”