Prison for News Agency Employee Who Fiddled Racing Results to Win Bets

A former gymnastic horse racing analyst at the UK’s subject intelligence government agency was sentenced to decade months in prison house Fri for tweaking results to ameliorate reflect his betting picks.

Hull Crown Margaret Court heard that Jack Bentham, from East Yorkshire, fraudulently “manipulated race information to change the rush results in his favor.”

In 2018, the 24-year-old briefly worked for PA Media, formerly the Press Association, which has long provided the betting manufacture with live racing information feeds. Jeremy Bentham began executing the scam on his first-class honours degree solar day of unsupervised work.

Bookies Smell a Rat

Prosecutors said Bentham would property bets on the favourite inwards a race. If it didn’t win, he would swap its label over to relieve oneself it the winner. Between October 13 and Oct 22 that year, his tinkering made him £15,000 from 105 bets., or just o'er US$20,000.

This meant some bettors who had picked winning horses did non find winnings they were entitled to, patch others received payouts they shouldn’t have.

But the tribunal heard betting operators SkyBet, Mick Power, and Bet365 smelled a rat, complaining to PA Media after detecting suspicious betting patterns.

Paddy Power suspended Bentham’s account, which contained around £5,000 (US$6,800) at the time.

‘Staggering’ Fraud

“This was a serious breach of trust,” said Judge Megan Rhys. “The unwavering of dupery committed over such a short full stop of clip was quite an frankly staggering, and it started on the really 1st day your oversight ended.”

She added that the incident had undermined cartel in PA Media, which “trades on its unity and reputation.”

Bentham pleaded shamed to fraudulence by insult of billet in August. His defence attorney, Stephen Robinson, said Jeremy Bentham had been involved in play since before he was 18, the sound eld inward the UK, and this had “swiftly led to an addiction.”

His client has taken steps to come up to this problem, self-excluding from bookmaking shops and betting sites. He has since found act with a bedchamber designing society and is inwards line for promotion, which means he testament shortly live inwards a billet to create compensation payments.

“He admitted the offense inward interview and made replete(p) and weenie admissions and expressions of regret,” Sugar Ray Robinson said. He is remorseful for his actions and aware of the disgrace that he has brought upon himself and his family, who make all supported him.”