Chad Elie

I was 25. Online poker was a multi-billion dollar industry with a payment processing problem — but not the one you'd think. After UIGEA passed in 2006, the operators didn't run out of processors. They ran out of honest ones. Every ISO and processor in the space was skimming, disappearing funds, or outright stealing. Daniel Tzvetkoff alone walked off with $100 million of their money.

I stepped into that mess and provided something nobody else would: transparent, reliable processing for years. Bank-approved infrastructure. No fraud. No vanishing funds. A bank signed off, and the entire industry ran on what I built. PokerStars. Full Tilt. I became the exclusive underwriter for the two biggest operators in the world — because I was the guy who didn't steal.

Then came one of the proudest moments of my life: I received an exclusive contract directly from Isai Scheinberg, the founder of PokerStars. This was on the eve of the Harry Reid bill — Scheinberg was putting the odds at 75% that Harry could get it done. He chose me to build the rails for what came next. That meant something.

That era taught me everything about building payment infrastructure that survives hostility. Not theoretical risk management — the kind where every transaction can be your last.

The DOJ unsealed indictments against the founders of PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker, and Absolute Poker — along with the payment processors who kept the money flowing. I was one of them. The case was brought by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York, led by Preet Bharara — who was later fired by President Trump. The judge was Lewis Kaplan.

Federal prosecutors charged a conspiracy — specifically, conspiracy to commit bank fraud and to operate illegal gambling businesses. The plea only required satisfying one element, and I allocuted to the gambling and online poker side — not to defrauding any bank. No bank lost a dollar. No bank was deceived by me. The "bank fraud" theory rested entirely on "reputational risk" — the idea that processing payments for a legal industry somehow harmed a bank's reputation, and that alone constituted fraud. But here's the thing — the banks knew exactly what was going on.

The judge said I engaged in "a criminally reckless spitting in the eye of the government" — that I played catch-me-if-you-can. Today, that's called innovation. I built payment rails that worked, that a bank signed off on, that an entire industry ran on. The government just didn't like who they served.

We didn't go quietly. The defense brought in Paul Clement — the 43rd Solicitor General of the United States, a man who has argued more cases before the U.S. Supreme Court since 2000 than any lawyer in or out of government. Clement stood in that courtroom and argued that all counts should be dismissed. The DOJ's own Office of Legal Counsel had just issued a new opinion narrowing the Wire Act. The IGBA and UIGEA charges didn't hold up. Poker wasn't gambling. The entire indictment was built on a legal theory that was falling apart in real time.

The hearing was standing room only. The poker world, the legal community, the press — everyone understood what was at stake. This wasn't just about me or the other defendants. This was about whether the federal government could criminalize an entire industry on a theory no court had ever validated.

Judge Kaplan denied the motion. Eight pages. He wrote that the poker-is-not-gambling argument "fails, at least at this stage" — and refused to dismiss a single count. The best constitutional lawyer in the country laid it all out, and Kaplan had already made up his mind. That's the thing about that courtroom: it didn't matter what you argued or who argued it. The outcome was decided before the hearing started.

This isn't some grand crusade — I just want to know what actually happened. The FOIA request is about getting the facts we didn't have at the time. Simple as that.

There are real questions. My attorney, Jeff Ifrah, had potential conflicts of interest. There were proffer sessions with the government I'm still piecing together. SDNY leadership wrote a letter memorializing a charging threshold — then retracted it. Legal opinions from John Ashcroft's firm were provided to prosecutors and may not have been fully considered.

Here's the part that still doesn't sit right: I got a felony. My banker got a misdemeanor. I should have had neither. At worst, this was a civil dispute — not a criminal case.

And then there's the prosecutor, AUSA Arlo Devlin-Brown. This is the same man who had his 82-year-old neighbor arrested over a fence dispute — an elderly retired teacher who spray-painted her own address on a fence she believed was on her property. He weaponized criminal charges over what was, at most, a civil matter. Sound familiar? After leaving SDNY, Devlin-Brown went into private practice and represented Anthony Weiner — a man who pleaded guilty to sending obscene material to a 15-year-old. Devlin-Brown argued Weiner should get no prison time. But when it came to me — a payment processor where no bank lost a dime — prison was exactly what he pushed for. Let that contrast sit for a moment.

And underneath all of it sits the question nobody wanted to answer honestly: is poker a game of skill? Because if it is, these weren't gambling transactions — and the entire basis for prosecution falls apart. We had studies. We had legal opinions — including one from former Attorney General John Ashcroft and former U.S. Attorney Catherine Hannaway concluding poker is a skill-based game. Freakonomics did a study reaching the same conclusion. But Judge Kaplan wouldn't allow the skill-based argument or the Ashcroft legal opinions into the case.

The Second Circuit Court of Appeals recently overturned Kaplan in another case for doing the exact same thing — wrongfully excluding evidence that went to the heart of the defense. That pattern should sound familiar to anyone who followed my case.

And here's what makes it sting: just months after my case, another judge in the same district — Judge Weinstein in United States v. DiCristina — issued a 120-page opinion ruling that poker is predominantly a game of skill, not gambling. Same district. Same question. Different judge. Different outcome. If my case had landed in front of Weinstein instead of Kaplan, the entire thing may have gone differently.

When President Trump deregulated banking during his first term, the door opened back up. I got back into payments and started building LeisurePay — payment infrastructure for legal industries that traditional banking won't serve. Cannabis is legal in most states but can't get a bank account. Hemp is federally legal but processors won't touch it. Crypto needs compliant on-ramps. The same problem I solved in poker exists everywhere.

It's been amazing since. Same operator-first discipline, same obsession with compliance and keeping things alive — just in industries that are finally ready for real infrastructure.

Forbes wrote about it in 2025: the "Legal Yet Unbankable" $100 billion underserved market. The problem I got prosecuted for solving is now a massive, recognized opportunity.

Most of my energy goes into building — LeisurePay, modern payment rails, partner ecosystems for regulated commerce. That's the day job and it's what I'm good at.

On the side, I filed a FOIA request with the DOJ. Not to relitigate anything — just to fill in the blanks. What did the internal discussions look like? How did charging decisions get made? What role did attorney conflicts play? I just want the facts on the record.

None of this — the building, the FOIA, any of it — means what it means without the people next to me.

My son is four years old. He's the love of my life and everything. When you've been through what I've been through, you understand what actually matters — and it's him. Every rail I build, every fight I take on, it's so he grows up knowing his dad didn't quit and didn't back down.

And my fiancée, Leanna — the most amazing woman I've ever met. She's grounded my core in a way I didn't know was possible. She sees me for who I really am, and everything I'm building now has her fingerprints on the foundation.