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SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 2010 All bets are on for Fairfax police gambling from C1
Not a victimless crime Fairfax’s most notorious gam- bling investigation ended in dis- aster. In 2006, an undercover de- tective lost more than $5,000 while betting on NFL games with optometrist Salvatore J. Culosi — and when the detective called in a SWAT team to make the arrest, an officer shot Culosi once in the heart and killed him.
Still, the police continue to pursue sports gamblers. Why? “It’s nowhere near a victimless
DAYNA SMITH FOR THE WASHINGTON POST Jeff Barnett greets Alvin Moore in Herndon. With Moore are daughters Sarah, 11, and Sabrina, 3.
Barnett cites population growth and area’s infrastructure needs
barnett from C1
doesn’t bode well. The 10th District can support
a Democrat: President Obama won it by seven percentage points in his 2008 campaign. The district backed Democrats Timo- thy M. Kaine for governor in 2005, James Webb for Senate in 2006 and Mark Warner for Sen- ate in 2008. Democrats rode a wave of mo- mentum in 2006 and 2008, pick- ing up House and Senate seats across the country — including in Virginia. Yet Wolf won both campaigns with ease, beating two-time Democratic nominee Judy Feder by 16 and then 20 points. Feder, a former Clinton admin-
istration official and longtime faculty member at Georgetown’s Public Policy Institute, had the support of national Democrats and raised more than $3.6mil- lion combined for the two races. Obama was also on the ballot in 2008, helping to drive Demo- cratic turnout. Barnett has none of those ad-
vantages. He had $66,000 in his campaign account as of June 30, a fraction of what Feder had at the same point in her campaigns. Wolf had $550,000 in the bank June 30.
Also, Barnett is not well known in the district. He lived in many places during his 26 years in the Air Force, including stints in Virginia working at the Penta- gon and in Croatia as part of a U.N. peacekeeping force. He went to work for Booz Allen Hamilton in 1999 before joining Toffler Associates in 2003. Bar- nett has written two books — “Future War” in 1996 and “The Job Box” in 2009.
The political climate But Barnett has never run for
office, and he chose to jump into
politics in a year when the tide appears to have turned in favor of Republicans. Congressional Democrats are busy trying to de- fend four Virginia incumbents from concerted GOP attacks, and aren’t likely to offer any financial or organizational support to Bar- nett’s bid. “This race isn’t going to be about money. It’s about mes- sage,” Barnett said. He doesn’t have the cash to run ads or send out much mail, but he thinks he has enough to run a “sophisti- cated grass-roots campaign.” As for the political climate,
Barnett said, “this anti-incum- bent mood we all hear about — it’s not an anti-Democrat mood, and every incumbent should be running scared.” Wolf doesn’t appear to be scared, but Scandling said the in- cumbent is campaigning as though the race is close — as he always does. He spent the August congressional recess crisscross- ing the district, visiting voters and businesses concerned about the economy. “The message loud and clear from the business community is: ‘We don’t know what to do next,’ ” Scandling said, suggest- ing that Obama’s policies were to blame for economic uncertainty. “Over the past six weeks, you’re seeing a huge anti-president mood.” Barnett had a similar takeaway from his 80-mile trek — “people out there are scared” — but he mostly blames the policies of the Bush White House, backed by Wolf, for the sluggish economy and ballooning budget deficit. Barnett said he would have voted in favor of Obama’s finan- cial regulation and health reform bills, both of which Wolf voted against. Barnett won’t say how he would have voted on the 2009 “cap and trade” climate bill, which Wolf opposed.
Although he criticizes Wolf for wanting to repeal the health re- form bill, Barnett acknowledges that the measure is unpopular. “It’s too much change in too short a period of time — what Al- vin Toffler called ‘future shock,’ ” Barnett said.
Looking ahead
Barnett’s focus on the future seems fitting in a wealthy, fast- growing district that includes all of Loudoun County and part of Fairfax County and is heavily de- pendent on the technology in- dustry. The rapid pace of change in the 10th District presents many problems for the region’s leaders. “People are going to be moving here, and we don’t have the infra- structure for it,” Barnett said. Barnett contends that Wolf
“didn’t get enough federal mon- ey” for the Dulles Metrorail ex- tension. On another subject of lo- cal controversy — the high tolls on the Dulles Greenway — Bar- nett said Wolf should have moved years ago to prevent the road’s private owner from raising tolls. But Barnett doesn’t say ex- actly what he might do differ- ently on either subject if he were elected. “That’s ignorance on his part,” Scandling said of Barnett. “He clearly doesn’t even understand the [Dulles Metro] project. . . . I don’t think Tim Kaine or Mark Warner would criticize Frank Wolf for his efforts on Dulles rail. . . . If he has a plan for transpor- tation, what is it? And how are you going to pay for it?” Barnett didn’t offer a plan, but his campaign Web site touts the development of “next genera- tion” transportation rather than continuing to modify existing roads and bridges. “You’ve got to have a forward
look,” he said.
ben.pershing@
wpost.com
crime,” said Sgt. James Cox, who heads the money laundering unit. “And it’s always the wrong people who get hurt.” Cox said sports bettors have been found “betting their kids’ college money away. Losing their family’s houses over it. You’ve got crimes of violence.” In Fairfax’s biggest sports gam- bling case, the long-running op- eration overseen by Raj Bansal and his sons, Cox said Bansal took over a mortgage on a house lost by one of his bettors, then got the Fairfax sheriff ’s office to evict the bettor’s family. Many bookies, including one connected to a Fairfax case in 2007, have ties to organized crime. The process of actually making
bets has gone high-tech, but it doesn’t necessarily make the in- vestigations any tougher, Cox said. Many local bookies now use Web sites run by offshore compa- nies, which keep track of the bet- tors and their wagers but don’t handle the actual money. That’s still done by the book- ies, who collect their winnings on Tuesday and make payouts on Wednesday, Cox said. He had no estimate of how widespread sports gambling is locally, but “every year we hear about more.” The money laundering squad
has investigated about 60 sports gambling cases since it was founded in 2004, and another 15 dating to the late 1990s, said Capt. Erin Schaible, head of the Fairfax police’s organized crime and narcotics section. Since
2004, the squad has seized about $1 million in cash and assets an- nually, but some of those cases landed in federal court, where money is divided among various agencies, Schaible said. Asked for an accounting of the cases, police provided a list of 18 defendants dating back to 1999. Of those, four were sent to feder- al court and received prison sen- tences — including Bansal and his two sons. The other was Fair- fax Station business owner Dwight Day, whose lawyer said he was a drug user and a losing bettor, not a bookie. Cox said Day took bets for an organized crime bookmaker from Philadelphia. Of the other 14, only one
served jail time (three months for a misdemeanor). One case from 2006, that of admitted bookmaker Kyle Peters, resulted in police seizing and keeping $566,940 from his bank ac- counts. Schaible said such funds are recycled “back into investi- gating cases. It’s helping us re- solve these and fight further crime.”
A lot on the table
One such recycling was the case of Man Kit Yau, a 61-year-old Chinese national living in Las Ve- gas. Bettors placed wagers through a Web site called abet-
sports.com, and Yau had a net- work of “sub-bookies” in Fairfax who collected from and paid Yau’s customers, as well as their own, Cox said. “He, in turn, sent his money to
China,” Cox said. “We tried to get it. It’s hard to get to China.” At some point, Fairfax police arrested one of Yau’s sub-bookies and seized a large amount of cash. Cox declined to say how much, saying that it would ex- pose cooperating witnesses. But that’s when the recycling began, or “using bad guys’ money to get more bad guys,” as Cox put it. Police began using informants
to make bets with Yau, and also maintained the local sports book to keep the investigation from collapsing, Cox said. “Collec-
At Senior Olympics, chasing a goal
tions” were shipped to Yau in Las Vegas by money orders, Cox said, and Yau sometimes sent back winnings. Cox said the police also had to pay the Web site’s weekly fees of $50 per player. In the end, Fairfax police sent
Yau $125,000 more than he sent back.
“I was just sort of astounded,”
Yau’s attorney, Kenneth Robin- son of the District, said during Yau’s sentencing, “that the coun- ty actually spent the $125,000 that they lost betting on this.” Cox said the police weren’t do- ing the betting, but the county did absorb the loss. Schaible ac- knowledged the money could have been saved and used for other purposes, but “part of our directive is to utilize assets to further investigation. So it’s a very legitimate and upfront cost to us. . . . For us, it’s not a profit- loss thing. It helps further the next investigation.” Yau was ordered to repay the $125,000 at $250 a month. Another defendant in the same
investigation was bookie Thuyen Chi Oo, who operated out of the Eden Center. Cox said Oo was a sub-bookie of Yau’s. At his sen- tencing hearing, he was ordered to repay $100,000, which one prosecutor said was “generous” in light of how much Oo actually cost Fairfax police in bets and costs. Oo was ordered to make restitution of $200 per month. Schaible declined to say how much money police lost to Oo, saying it would jeopardize the in- formant. Fairfax Assistant Com- monwealth’s Attorney Michael Gromosaik and Oo’s lawyer Mike Weatherbee also declined to pro- vide a dollar amount. Two sourc- es familiar with the case said the amount was close to $180,000. “That was an extreme case,” Cox said of the Yau investigation. “But you had to let that case run its course. What we seized in that case overcame everything. We locked up 10 or 11 people and seized lots of money,” though he would not say how much.
jackmant@washpost.com
DAYNA SMITH FOR THE WASHINGTON POST
The Northern Virginia Senior Olympics, featuring adults 50 and older, opened a week of competition in Arlington on Saturday. Robert Hannah competes in the 200-meter run.
Montgomery neighborhood could have an even stronger grip on county council montgomery from C1
Leventhal said. “Nobody forced them to choose three guys from the same neighborhood.” On one end of Montgomery’s
equivalent to Pennsylvania Av- enue is Leventhal’s midsize home with a fenced yard and a blue- and-white campaign sign out front. On the other end is a two- story brick home across from Sli- go Creek Elementary School where Ervin, a former member of the Board of Education, lives. At- Large incumbent Elrich and new- comer Riemer live on side streets along the way.
On a three-mile walk start to
finish through the quartet’s base Thursday, few of those headed home from the Takoma Metro station or watching a football practice from the sidelines knew they were in the midst of such a concentration of county author- ity. And some didn’t much care. “I have no expectations. Let’s put it that way,” said Glenn Triv- ers, a postal carrier watching a helmeted group of kids tackle a yellow dummy at Takoma Park Middle School on Piney Branch Road not far from Leventhal’s home. Trivers was among about 20 percent of Montgomery voters who turned out Tuesday. He said he voted for Gov. Martin O’Malley and a school board member whose name sounded familiar but couldn’t remember whether he selected any of the council
candidates. But head further along Piney
Branch and make a left at the large potholes on the way toward Riemer’s house, and there was some recognition of the benefits of living in Montgomery’s local corridor of power. “It’s knowing these folks. They live where you live. They under- stand what issues you have,” said Ed Bordley, a federal government lawyer. “You run into them every day, and you feel like you can say, ‘How about this issue? What about getting a light down here at the school so the kids can cross Piney Branch Road safely?’ ” Bordley, who is blind and was walking home with his German shepherd guide dog, Kaleb, said he loves the location not far from Metro, the tomatoes from his neighbors and the nearby church that serves as his faith-based hub of activism on social issues, which includes promoting afford- able housing. And he thinks the nature of the community is such that it wouldn’t abuse its outsized influence. “I’d like to think we have the interests of the rest of the county at heart,” Bordley said. But some from elsewhere in
Montgomery would prefer a little more geographic power sharing. “It gives that area a very, very strong voice on the county coun- cil,” said council member Phil An- drews (D-Gaithersburg/Rock- ville). The political culture of activ-
ism in the Takoma Park-Silver Spring area helped the four ride to victory Tuesday, despite the changing trend of where people are living in Montgomery. The county’s population center has been creeping northward each decade since 1960 and was in Rockville in 2000, according to county officials. Several years ago, Andrews pressed the case for getting rid of at-large districts altogether and dividing the county into nine dis- tricts instead. Voters rejected that in a 2004 referendum. “A countywide district is huge. times the size of a congres-
It’s 11⁄2
sional district, and it’s larger than several states” in population, An- drews said, adding that officials would be “closer to the people” with smaller districts. “It’s very hard for people who aren’t able to raise a lot of money to break into a countywide race.” Even primary winner Ervin questions the wisdom of the clus- tering of officialdom. As a strong and early supporter of Riemer, she’s partly responsible. But she’s had concerns about the appear- ance and reality of the situation. “I really think the best way to
govern the county is to have rep- resentatives from all the different areas of the county. It’s a 500- square-mile jurisdiction,” Ervin said. “I don’t think it’s necessarily a great idea to have so many members of the County Council living in one area. People may feel
that area will get special atten- tion.” As the council member for Dis-
trict 5, which covers Silver Spring and Takoma Park, Ervin said she’s experienced firsthand the confu- sion of having so much represent- ing going on in one place. It took a while for her, Elrich and Leven- thal to stop running into one an- other, she said. “It got really messy there for a while. Things would happen, and I wouldn’t know about it. People would get confused in the community: ‘Who do I call? I’ve got George, I’ve got Marc, I’ve got Valerie, and now I’ve got Hans,’ ” Ervin said. It’s Montgomery’s hybrid polit- ical system and a good-govern- ment appeal that allowed this to happen. Instead of having only district council members, as in Prince George’s County, or district su- pervisors and a countywide board chairman, as in Fairfax County, Montgomery reserves four at-large seats under the theory that doing so is a good way to keep a focus on the long view. The current system shapes the tone of debate on difficult issues, such as where to place so-called LULUs, or locally unpopular land uses, said Royce Hanson, the for- mer county planning chairman who lost his council bid Tuesday. “The district representative knows they are working in a con- text in which the district view has to adapt to countywide concerns
and countywide interests,” said Hanson, who has argued against moves to only have district repre- sentatives in Montgomery. Such an arrangement would make peo- ple “take too parochial a view of things,” Hanson said. Council member Andrews re-
jected that argument. It hasn’t proved true in Fairfax, he said. And by Hanson’s logic, Mary- land’s delegates, senators and congressional representatives should run at-large statewide, Andrews said.
Hanson had another point. Un- der today’s system, each voter can cast ballots for the majority of council members. That’s great if you don’t like your council mem- ber, he said. “If you’re represented by only one person, where do you go?” Hanson asked. “If you’ve got a district representative, and you’ve got four at-large represen- tatives, you’ve got five avenues to try to influence policy instead of just one.”
larism@washpost.com
LOTTERIES September 18
DISTRICT Mid-Day Lucky Numbers:
Mid-Day D.C. 4: Mid-Day DC-5:
Lucky Numbers (Fri.): Lucky Numbers (Sat.): D.C. 4 (Fri.): D.C. 4 (Sat.): DC-5 (Fri.): DC-5 (Sat.): Daily 6 (Fri.): Daily 6 (Sat.):
MARYLAND Mid-Day Pick 3:
Mid-Day Pick 4:
Night/Pick 3 (Fri.): Pick 3 (Sat.): Pick 4 (Fri.): Pick 4 (Sat.): Match 5 (Fri.): Match 5 (Sat.):
6-7-7 5-8-1-6
4-8-0-2-7 2-2-4 6-1-7
7-5-9-1 6-8-2-2
1-5-9-6-9 5-1-8-9-8
7-15-21-24-38-39 *4 12-15-17-21-22-25 *24
4-8-0
7-5-2-6 7-9-7 0-1-1
7-6-6-7 4-6-2-9
9-11-15-30-34 *1 2-11-21-23-25 *18
VIRGINIA Day/Pick-3:
Pick-4: Cash-5:
Night/Pick-3 (Fri.): Pick-3 (Sat.): Pick-4 (Fri.): Pick-4 (Sat.): Cash-5 (Fri.): Cash-5 (Sat.): Win for Life:
MULTI-STATE GAMES Powerball:
Power Play:
Mega Millions: Hot Lotto:
*Bonus Ball **Mega Ball
All winning lottery numbers are official only when validated at a lottery ticket location or a lottery claims office. Because of late drawings, some results do not appear in early editions. For late lottery results, check
www.washingtonpost.com/lottery.
4-9-7 9-1-3-9
3-8-20-22-34 5-2-1 N/A
1-9-2-6 N/A
13-15-21-25-34 N/A N/A
N/A N/A
3-4-14-18-27 **13 N/A
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