Former Washington Wizards basketball player Gilbert Arenas, suspected Israeli organized crime figure Yevgeni Gershman and four others were arrested on Wednesday for allegedly operating illegal high-stakes poker games at a mansion that Arenas owns in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Encino, the U.S. Justice Department said.
Arenas, 43, was charged with three counts: conspiracy to operate an illegal gambling business, operating an illegal gambling business and making false statements to federal investigators.
The five others—Yevgeni Gershman (49), Evgenni Tourevski (48), Allan Austria (52), Yarin Cohen (27) and Ievgen Krachun (43)—were charged with two counts: conspiracy to operate an illegal gambling business and operating an illegal gambling business. Gershman is a “suspected organized crime figure from Israel,” per the Justice Department.
All five were scheduled to be arraigned in the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles on Wednesday afternoon.
The defendants ran an illegal gambling business from September 2021 to July 2022, according to the indictment, which was returned on July 15 and unsealed on Wednesday.
“Arenas rented out an Encino mansion he owned for the purpose of hosting high-stakes illegal poker games. At Arenas’s direction, Arthur Kats, 51, of West Hollywood, staged the mansion to host the games, found co-conspirators to host the games and collected rent from the co-conspirators on Arenas’s behalf,” the Justice Department said.
Gershman, Tourevski, Austria and Cohen managed illegal games and took in a “rake” fee of a percentage or set amount per hand. Krachun was a “chip runner,” who distributed chips and managed payroll, per the Justice Department.
Gershman also hired young women, who served drinks, gave massages and “offered companionship” to players for tips, the Justice Department alleges. The women paid a “tax” of a percentage of their tips. The illegal games also allegedly had chefs, valets and armed guards on the payroll.
The Israeli citizen and Valentina Cojocari, 35, were also charged with three other counts: conspiracy to commit marriage fraud, marriage fraud and making a false statement on an immigration document, per the department, which said that Gershman paid Cojocari to enter a “sham marriage,” so he could get permanent legal status.
Per the department, Gershman lied on his immigration forms when asked if he had ever been detained by law enforcement and whether he planned to gamble illegally.
