LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WAVE) - The story has gripped the nation, entangling professional basketball and the American Mafia in two federal gambling probes dubbed “Operation Royal Flush” and “Operation Nothing But Net.”
Friday, WAVE News uncovered new details about a Kentucky man named in one of the indictments, whom the FBI accuses of supplying cheating technology and organizing rigged poker games.
“The charges and the arrests that were taken down across this country range from wire fraud, money laundering, extortion, robbery, illegal gambling,” said Kash Patel, Director of the FBI.
According to the U.S. Justice Department, Robert Stroud was arrested by the FBI, one of 31 defendants arrested across 11 states, including members and associates of the Bonanno, Gambino, and Genovese organized crime families of La Cosa Nostra, along with Chauncey Billups, head coach of the Portland Trail Blazers of the National Basketball Association (NBA) and Damon Jones, also known as “Dee,” a former NBA player with the Cleveland Cavaliers and Miami Heat.
According to the FBI, Stroud supplied cheating technology, organized rigged poker games and arranged and committed a gunpoint robbery to steal a rigged card shuffler machine. Celebrities like Billups were allegedly used to lure in poker players to the rigged games.
Several photos released by the U.S. Justice Department show examples of the technology used, including a photo of an X-ray poker table that was taken from Stroud’s iCloud.
“This alleged illegal gambling operation hustled unwitting victims out of tens of millions of dollars and created a financial pipeline for La Cosa Nostra to help fund and facilitate their organized criminal activity,” said Christopher Rea, assistant director for the FBI New York Field Office.
A WAVE news investigation uncovered Stroud’s criminal history, with ties to violence and gambling spanning decades.
In March of 1994, court records from Jefferson Circuit Court state that Stroud was playing cards and gambling at a home in Louisville, and sometime that evening, shot a man through the door of that home, killing him.
Then, in 2001, a Commonwealth of Kentucky Uniform Citation states that Stroud was pulled over for expired tags, and a police officer found “sports betting cards, dice, playing cards and what appeared to be gambling records” in the backseat.
According to property records, Stroud currently owns a home with his wife in Louisville.
Stroud isn’t the only Louisville tie to the prominent indictments. Current NBA player Terry Rozier was a standout for the Louisville Cardinals men’s basketball team from 2013-2015. Thursday, [WAVE News covered his alleged role](https://www.wave3.com/2025/10/23/former-uofl-player-terry-rozier-has-been-arrested-connection-with-federal-sports-betting-probe-sources-tell-ap/) in the FBI investigation.
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