Orland Park bookie sentenced to 18 months in federal prison

From staff reports

An Orland Park man was sentenced last week to a year and a half in federal prison for conducting an illegal sports gambling business and laundering the proceeds.

Vincent Delgiudice, also known as “Uncle Mick,” 58, directed an illegal bookmaking business in the Chicago area from 2016 to 2019, U.S. prosecutors said.

Delgiudice retained a company in Costa Rica to operate a website, Unclemicksports.com, that gamblers used to place wagers on professional and collegiate sporting events. Delgiudice worked with more than 20 agents and sub-agents who recruited gamblers and shared in the profits from the gamblers’ losses. The agents and sub-agents managed more than 1,000 gamblers, meeting them as necessary to settle up and collect losses from them. Delgiudice laundered the profits in a variety of ways, including making cash investments in businesses and having gamblers directly pay his personal expenses.

Delgiudice pleaded guilty last year to conspiracy and gambling charges. In addition to the 18-month prison sentence, U.S. District Judge Virginia M. Kendall ordered Delgiudice to forfeit $3.6 million in criminally derived proceeds, including $1.06 million in cash and $450,000 worth of silver bars, jewelry and gold coins, that were found in his Orland Park home when agents raided it in April 2019.

Before the sentence was handed down, Delgiudice read a brief statement to the court apologizing for any hurt he caused.

“I understand what I did was wrong and I affected many people with my poor decisions,” he said. “I would like nothing more than to start the process of making things right for my family, my friends and the community.”

The sentence was announced by John R. Lausch Jr., U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois; Emmerson Buie Jr., Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago office of the FBI; and Justin Campbell, Acting Special Agent-in-Charge of the IRS Criminal Investigation Division in Chicago. The FBI’s Integrity in Sport and Gaming Initiative is designed to tackle illegal sports gambling and combat threats of influence from criminal enterprises.

“While cloaked with a professional veneer and flashy website, this was a sordid operation,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Terry M. Kinney argued in the government’s sentencing memorandum. “He preyed upon individuals’ addictions to line his pockets.”