(File Photo: Source for Photo: FILE – An NCAA logo displayed on the fence before an NCAA softball game between Jacksonville and FGCU, March 24, 2024, in Jacksonville, Fla. (AP Photo/Gary McCullough, File)
(AP) One of the so-called fixers in a sprawling betting scheme that allegedly raked in millions of dollars off of big bets on rigged NCAA basketball games pleaded guilty Monday.
Jalen Smith appeared in federal court in Philadelphia and pleaded guilty to wire fraud and bribery charges, becoming the first of 26 people charged in the scheme to formally do so. It came a week before the start of March Madness, in which bettors will wager billions legally — and illegally — on the 68 college basketball teams in the tournament.
Smith, of Charlotte, North Carolina, trained and developed local basketball players for professional scouting combines and used those connections with players when he became part of the scheme, according to prosecutors.
The charges against Smith and 25 others were unsealed in January. Smith’s lawyer, Rocco Cipparone, said in an interview that Smith pleaded guilty to get the matter behind him, serve whatever sentence he’ll be given and “move forward in his life in a positive direction.”
Smith had begun talking to prosecutors about a guilty plea well before he was formally charged, and the possibility that others in the case might plead guilty didn’t have any impact on his decision making, Cipparone said.
Besides the fixers who recruited players and placed bets, the charges targeted 17 former college basketball players and four other players who were active with their college teams this season.
More than a dozen players tried to fix games as recently as last season and some helped recruit other players, federal prosecutors said.
Two of the players charged were banned by the NCAA after a separate point-shaving investigation. One of the two, former University of New Orleans player Dae Dae Hunter, said on ABC’s “Good Morning America” that he participated in point-shaving to get money to care for his child.
It is the latest gambling scandal to hit the sports world since a 2018 U.S. Supreme Court decision unleashed a meteoric rise in legal sports betting.
Smith was active in helping fix games in the 2023-24 and 2024-25 seasons, placing bets and recruiting players with the promise of a big payment in exchange for purposefully underperforming during a game, prosecutors said.
The fixers would then bet against the players’ teams in those games, defrauding sportsbooks and other bettors, authorities said.
Smith often traveled to meet players to deliver cash payments by hand, prosecutors said. In one case, Smith traveled to Louisiana to arrange the delivery of about $32,000 in cash to two of the players charged in the scheme, prosecutors said.
Smith also pleaded guilty to a separate weapons charge, stemming from an FBI search of Smith’s bedroom at a house in North Carolina last May where agents found a loaded handgun in a hamper underneath some clothing.
Smith was prohibited from possessing the weapon as a condition of a drug conviction in 2018, and told agents that he had bought it from a man outside a sneaker store in Charlotte, the plea agreement said. Agents later found that it had been reported stolen.
The point-shaving scheme began with two games in the Chinese Basketball Association in 2023, according to the indictment. Successful there, fixers recruited Smith and two other fixers and moved on to rigging NCAA games, and the last game they fixed was in January 2025, it said.
Their scheme grew to involve more than 39 players on more than 17 different NCAA Division I men’s basketball teams, who then rigged and attempted to rig more than 29 games, prosecutors said.
They wagered millions of dollars, raking in “substantial proceeds” for themselves, and paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to players in bribes, prosecutors said. Payments to players typically ranged from $10,000 to $30,000 per game, they said.
Prosecutors named more than 40 schools where games were allegedly targeted by the scheme. Those included Tulane University and DePaul University.
Rigged games included major conferences and some playoffs, including the first round of the Horizon League championship and the second round of the Southland Conference championship, prosecutors said.
Players often recruited teammates to cooperate by playing badly, sitting out or keeping the ball away from players who weren’t in on the scheme to prevent them from scoring. Sometimes the attempted fix failed, meaning the fixers lost their bets, prosecutors said.
