Major Gambling Ring Broken Up In Queens & Costa Rica
A two-year investigation dubbed 'Operation Toll Free' by law enforcement, netted 36 arrests last week in a major gambling ring that operated in Queens, New York and Costa Rica.

Queens District Attorney Richard Brown announced the illegal operation on May 18th, saying the ring handled up to 2,000 bets a day on horseracing, baseball, football and other sporting events, netting over $2.5 million in one day during the 2005 NFL playoffs.

The two-year total was what the district attorney called “a staggering us$360 million.” He said that the highly sophisticated gambling ring was controlled by the Bonanno organized crime family.

“Organized crime reaps huge profits from illegal gambling that evade taxation and underwrite its other more insidious forms of corruption, such as labor racketeering, drug trafficking, auto theft, insurance fraud and loan sharking. Illegal gambling is by no means a victimless crime; it provides the fuel that allows organized crime to operate.”

In Costa Rica, the mob-run ring ran a sportsbook operaion in Mall San Pedro, west of San José, using computers, the internet, email and instant messaging to a website in addition to a toll free number to take bets.

According to the charges, the ring used an unusual wire room via an off-shore, Internet-based gambling service.

Reputed Bonanno captain, Anthony Urso, identified as an un0indicted co-conspirator, received a monthly tribute from the operation in exchange for protection from the Bonanno family.

Urso is currently in jail awaiting sentencing in federal court on other charges.