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 Mayors Against Illegal Guns is a national, bipartisan coalition of mayors working to make America’s communities safer by keeping illegal guns out of dangerous hands. Co-founded in 2006 by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino, the coalition consists of mayors from 43 states, including Republicans, Democrats, and Independents, from major cities and small towns around the country.

 New Investigation by Mayors Against Illegal Guns Shows Thousands of Individuals with Criminal Records are Seeking to Illegally Buy Guns Through Online Sales

 September 18, 2013 -- The bipartisan Mayors Against Illegal Guns coalition today announced the results of the first-ever national investigation into individual buyers with criminal records seeking to illegally acquire guns via online gun sales. The report concludes that thousands of people already barred by existing Federal law from purchasing guns are flocking to the Internet to evade background checks and acquire guns illegally, with no questions asked. The investigation – which examined online gun listings posted between February and May 2013 on the popular website Armslist.com – found that this single website could transfer more than 25,000 guns to individuals with criminal records just this year.

 Read the press release

 Read the full report here

 Hundreds of Americans Rally in Washington, DC to Launch Next Phase in National Fight to Fix Gun Background Check System

 September 19, 2013 -- A broad coalition of Americans from across the country – including survivors of gun violence and the families of its victims, members of Congress, law enforcement, gun owners, state and local elected officials, veterans, and faith leaders – held a rally in Washington, D.C. today as part of the “No More Names: National Drive to Reduce Gun Violence” bus tour. Over the last 100 days, the tour has traveled the nation, bringing Americans together at events in 25 states to urge elected officials to reconsider bipartisan gun background check legislation that enjoys overwhelming public support – but that a minority of U.S. Senators blocked in April. Today’s rally marked the bus tour’s return to Washington, D.C., and the launch of the next phase in the national fight to fix the gun background check system.

 Read the press release

 Statement of Mayors Against Illegal Guns Co-Chair Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg on Failure of U.S. Senate to Pass Gun Background Check Legislation

 New Polls in More Than 40 Districts and 20 States Show Voters Overwhelmingly Support Background Checks for All Gun Sales

 New polls released this week by Mayors Against Illegal Guns conducted by Douglas E. Schoen LLC showed likely voters in a wide range of states and congressional districts overwhelmingly support background checks for all gun sales. The average support for background checks for all gun sales among 41 congressional district polls was 89 percent; the average among 21 statewide polls was 86 percent. The findings of these surveys can be found at www.demandaction.org . Full-page advertisements in today's Washington Post, Politico and Roll Call feature the poll results along with members of Congress from these states and districts and their ratings from the National Rifle Association.

 Read the press release

 Mayors Against Illegal Guns Releases New PSA Demanding Action from Congress

 Mayors Against Illegal Guns has released a PSA featuring 30 mayors demanding that Congress take immediate action to prevent gun violence. The PSA marks a transition in the coalition's campaign from demanding a plan to demanding that Congress take action to pass legislation to require background checks for all sales, limit military-style assault weapons and high-capacity magazines and make gun trafficking a federal crime. The bipartisan coalition now includes more than 900 mayors from 45 states and more than 1.4 million grassroots supporters.

 Statements of Mayors Against Illegal Guns Co-Chairs on President Obama's Comprehensive Proposal to Reduce Gun Violence

 Mayors Against Illegal Guns Releases New Television Ad Demanding Action From Washington and Report On Gun Lobby Suppression of Research on Gun Violence on One-Month Anniversary of Newtown Shooting

 Marking one month since the tragedy in Newtown, Mayors Against Illegal Guns today released a new national television ad (available at www.demandaction.org) featuring family members of gun violence victims demanding that political leaders take immediate steps to end the gun violence that kills 33 Americans every day. Co-chair Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg also released "Access Denied", a new report that surveys all the efforts by the gun lobby, with the cooperation of Congress, to suppress data and research funding on gun violence, making it difficult to study the causes of gun violence and to hold the firearms industry accountable for their role in the epidemic. The report (available at www.demandaction.org) was released at a summit focused on gun violence research at Johns Hopkins University's Bloomberg School of Public Health.

 Read the press release

 Mayors Against Illegal Guns Launches New TV Ad on Second Anniversary of Tucson Shooting

 Two years after the Tucson mass shooting in which six were killed and former Representative Gabrielle Giffords was shot, Mayors Against Illegal Guns today released a new television ad featuring Roxanna Green, mother of Christina-Taylor Green, the nine year-old girl murdered that day. The 30-second spot opens with a scene from the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in which 20 children were killed. In the ad, Green demands that elected officials in Washington D.C. take immediate action to reduce gun violence in America. The ad can be viewed at www.demandaplan.org/christina-taylor.

 "How many more children must die before Washington does something to end our gun violence problem?" said Mayors Against Illegal Guns Co-Chair and New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg. "We need political leaders to hear Roxanna loud and clear: we cannot wait any longer for you to do something about gun violence. Another child should not have to die."

 "Roxanna Green knows all too well the pain of losing a loved one to gun violence - sadly, there are parents and siblings and friends who learn this every day in our country," said Mayors Against Illegal Guns Co-Chair and Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino. "It's time for Washington to act to reduce gun violence - for the 33 Americans that are killed every day and for all of our children."

 Read the full release here

 Watch the ad here

 Statements of Mayors Against Illegal Guns Co-Chairs On National Rifle Association Press Conference

 December 21, 2012 – “The NRA's Washington leadership has long been out of step with its members, and never has that been so apparent as this morning. Their press conference was a shameful evasion of the crisis facing our country. Instead of offering solutions to a problem they have helped create, they offered a paranoid, dystopian vision of a more dangerous and violent America where everyone is armed and no place is safe. Leadership is about taking responsibility, especially in times of crisis. Today the NRA's lobbyists blamed everyone but themselves for the crisis of gun violence. While they promote armed guards, they continue to oppose the most basic and common sense steps we can take to save lives - not only in schools, but in our movie theaters, malls, and streets. Enough. As a country, we must rise above special interest politics. Every day, nearly 34 Americans are murdered with guns. That's why 74 percent of NRA members support common sense restrictions like criminal background checks for anyone buying a gun. It is time for Americans who care about the Second Amendment and reasonable gun restrictions to join together to work with the President and Congress to stop the gun violence in this country. Demand a plan.”

 Read the full statement

 Coalition Members Send Concrete Proposals to Washington in the Wake of Newtown Mass Shooting

 December 19 – More than 750 member of Mayors Against Illegal Guns today sent a letter to President Obama and Congressional leadership urging passage of legislation to: close deadly loopholes in the national background check system; limit the availability of military style weapons and high-capacity magazines; and make gun trafficking a federal crime.

 Read the letter here

 Survivors and Family Members of Gun Violence Victims Demand a Plan to Reduce Gun Violence from Washington

 December 17, 2012 - Mayors Against Illegal Guns Co-Chair and New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg was joined today by survivors and family members of victims of gun violence to release personal videos demanding that elected officials in Washington D.C. take immediate action to reduce gun violence in America. The videos can be viewed at www.DemandAPlan.org The videos tell the stories of 34 Americans whose lives have been forever changed - whether in mass shootings in Aurora, Oak Creek, Tucson and Virginia Tech or in the daily gun violence that kills nearly 34 Americans every day. The diverse voices hail from urban and suburban areas across the country, young and old, of different races and religious backgrounds. Every story is different, but all survivors are united in their belief thatsomething must be done to prevent more tragedies like the one in Newtown, Connecticut and like the tragedy they personally experienced. “What happened in Newtown was an unspeakable crime – a mass murder in which six- and seven-year-old children were gunned down in their classrooms, along with their elementary school teachers and administrators,” said Mayor Bloomberg. “Gun violence is a national epidemic – and a national tragedy – that demands more than words. It demands immediate national action, from the President and from Congress. It needs to be at the top of their agenda.”

 Read the press release

 Watch and share the videos

 Statements of Mayors Against Illegal Guns Co-Chairs on Newtown, Connecticut Shooting

 December 14, 2012 – Statement of Mayor's Against Illegal Guns Co-Chair New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg: "With all the carnage from gun violence in our country, it's still almost impossible to believe that a mass shooting in a kindergarten class could happen. It has come to that. Not even kindergarteners learning their ABC's are safe. We heard after Columbine that it was too soon to talk about gun laws. We heard it after Virginia Tech. After Tucson and Aurora and Oak Creek. And now we are hearing it again. For every day we wait, nearly 34 more people are murdered with guns.

 Read the press release

 Michigan Mayors Against Illegal Guns, Police, Domestic Violence Opponents Block NRA Attempt to Eliminate Background Checks for Handguns Bought from Unlicensed Sellers

 The Michigan Senate today rejected an attempt to eliminate a law requiring people who buy handguns from unlicensed sellers to first pass a background check, voting instead to preserve every essential element of a system mayors and police called a successful crime-fighting tool.

 The vote marked a remarkable turnaround for legislation the National Rifle Association’s Washington office had designed as a vehicle to repeal the state’s “permit to purchase” system and eliminate the permit database maintained by the Michigan State Police. A version of the bill that would have gutted the permit system passed the Michigan House earlier this year and was widely expected to reach Governor Rick Snyder’s desk during the legislature’s lame-duck session.

 Read the press release

 Aurora Shooting Survivor Demands a Plan to Reduce Gun Violence From Presidential Candidates in Ad Campaign Aimed at Colorado Debate Viewers

 A survivor of the July mass shooting in Aurora, Colorado is appearing in a new TV ad asking the presidential candidates to explain how they will reduce gun violence when they meet to debate on Wednesday less than ten miles from the Cinemark theater where a dozen people were killed and 58 wounded. The ad features Stephen Barton, a recent Syracuse University graduate and Fulbright Scholarship recipient who was shot while spending the night in Aurora on a bicycle trip across America. The ad will air nationally during the week that President Barack Obama and Governor Mitt Romney meet at the University of Denver for their first face-to-face debate.

 Watch the TV ad featuring Stephen Barton

 Read the press release (PDF)

 Coalition Launches Interactive Map Showing Failure of States to Submit Mental Health Records

 August 16, 2012 - Mayors Against Illegal Guns has launched an interactive map showing how many mental health records each state has submitted to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), and comparing this performance with the best-performing states. Based on new FBI data updating the coalition's November 2011 Fatal Gaps report, the map shows that 21 states have each submitted fewer than 100 records. This continued failure to repair the system also spurred sixty-seven survivors and victims' family members of the 2007 Virginia Tech shooting to send a letter to President Obama and Governor Romney – demanding that the candidates announce plans to improve the nation's background check system.

 Visit DemandAPlan.org/FatalGaps to View the Interactive Map of NICS Records

 Read the coalition press release about the map and the Virginia Tech letter

 Read the letter from the Virginia Tech survivors and victims' family members to President Obama and Governor Romney (PDF)

 Download the November 2011 "Fatal Gaps" Report (PDF)

 Coalition Releases New Poll of NRA Members Showing Strong Support For Common-Sense Gun Laws

 July 24, 2012 - Mayors Against Illegal Guns released the findings of a recent survey by GOP pollster Frank Luntz showing that NRA members and gun owners overwhelmingly support a variety of laws designed to keep firearms out of dangerous hands. The survey's key findings include that 87 percent of NRA members agree that support for Second Amendment rights goes hand-in-hand with keeping guns out of the hands of criminals, and 74 percent of NRA members and 87 percent of non-NRA gun owners support requiring criminal background checks of anyone purchasing a gun.

 Download the Poll Results (PDF)

 Read the Press Release

 Mayors Against Illegal Guns Statement on Aurora Shooting

 Read the statements of Mayors Against Illegal Guns Co-Chairs New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino

 Mayors Oppose Concealed Carry Reciprocity Mandate

 Mayors oppose pending legislation in Congress that would allow Trayvon Martin's killer to carry hidden, loaded guns nationwide.

 Read the letter

 Coalition Co-Chairs Urge the U.S. Senate to Reject Bills That Would Override State Laws on Concealed, Loaded Guns

 March 15, 2012 - New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino join the more than 625 mayors, police officers, prosecutors and domestic violence experts who oppose legislation introduced in the U.S. Senate that would gut state rules for who can carry a concealed, loaded gun in public.

 Read the Statement

 Coalition Co-Chairs Star in Super Bowl Ad Promoting Common Sense Reforms to Keep Guns Out of the Hands of Criminals

 February 2, 2012 - This Sunday, during Super Bowl XLVI, Patriots fan and Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino and Giants fan and New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg will appear in a new television advertisement promoting common sense reforms to keep guns out of the hands of criminals.

 Watch the TV advertisement

 Learn more about common sense ways to fix the gun background check system at www.FixGunChecks.org

 Follow Mayors Against Illegal Guns on Facebook and Twitter.

 Fix Gun Checks: Delete Online Outlaws Urges Websites to Crack Down on Illegal Gun Sales

 December 14, 2011 - In response to a new investigation by the City of New York that exposed the vast, unregulated online market for illegal guns, Mayors Against Illegal Guns launched a grassroots effort to crack down on illegal online gun sales. The investigation found that 62% of sellers were willing to sell to individuals who said they couldn't pass a criminal background check. The coalition is urging Congress to take action to require a background check on all gun sales, and for websites to take simple steps to stop illegal sales: requiring sellers to register with the site before listing guns for sale online; requiring buyers to register with the site before contacting gun sellers; providing a simple mechanism to flag suspicious behavior; and auditing their own sites - as many sites are already doing.

 Learn more

 Read the coalition press release about the investigation

 New Coalition Report Shows State and Federal Failures Undermine Background Check System and Allow Substance Abusers and the Mentally Ill to Buy Guns

 November 14, 2011 - New Mayors Against Illegal Guns report reveals data showing that states and federal agencies fail to send millions of records to the federal firearms background check system, enabling substance abusers, the mentally ill and other dangerous individuals to pass background checks and purchase firearms.

 Download the report (in PDF)

 Read the press release

 Mayors Oppose Concealed Gun Mandate in New Ad

 October 20, 2011 - Mayors Against Illegal Guns placed a full-page ad in USA Today calling on the U.S. Senate to reject an effort to strip state authority to decide who can carry concealed, loaded guns in public. This federal mandate would threaten the safety of our communities by putting loaded guns in the hands of people who are too dangerous to qualify for a local permit.

 See the USA Today Advertisement (in PDF)

 Join Our Campaign at OurLivesOurLaws.org

 Read the Press Release

 Coalition Launches Campaign Against National Concealed Carry Reciprocity

 September 12, 2011 – A coalition of more than 600 mayors has launched a campaign to defend the rights of states to decide who can carry concealed, loaded guns. The campaign website, OurLivesOurLaws.org, highlights the broad opposition to the National Right-to-Carry Act (H.R.822) from law enforcement, faith leaders, domestic violence groups, and the more than 45,000 Americans who have signed the Our Lives, Our Laws petition. A new poll, also released today, shows that voters overwhelmingly oppose Congressional efforts to override state concealed carry laws.

 Read the Press Release

 Download the Poll Results (in PDF)

 Download the Fact Sheet for H.R. 822 (in PDF)

 Sign the Petition at OurLivesOurLaws.org

 Coalition Calls on President Obama to Strengthen and Better Enforce Gun Laws

 On the six-month anniversary of the tragic shooting in Tucson, Mayors Against Illegal Guns issued a letter calling on President Obama to prevent criminals, terrorists, and other dangerous people from obtaining illegal guns. The coalition members offered four concrete steps the administration could take without Congressional action to better enforce existing gun laws, reminding the President that over 6,100 Americans have died from gun violence since the Tucson shooting.

 Read the Letter to President Obama

 Mayors Urge Repeal of Restrictions that Impede Investigation of "Fast & Furious"

 Mayors Michael R. Bloomberg and Thomas M. Menino, coalition co-chairs, called on Congressional leaders to repeal the Tiahrt restrictions that are blocking Congressional oversight of the ATF's controversial "Operation Fast & Furious." ATF allegedly allowed guns to be illegally trafficked to Mexico, possibly putting law enforcement officers in danger. The Tiahrt Amendments prohibit ATF from sharing crime gun trace data. As a result, Congress has been forced to request trace data connected to the Fast & Furious investigation from the Mexican Government.

 Read the Letter to Congressional Leaders

 Mayors Launch TV Ad Addressing Al Qaeda Gun Plot

 A coalition of more than 600 mayors has launched a national TV ad campaign calling attention to a recent Al Qaeda propaganda video that urges the terrorist group's followers to exploit loopholes to purchase firearms without background checks. The mayors' ad is running on national cable news programs this week. It urges Congress to pass the Fix Gun Checks Act of 2011 and the Denying Firearms to Dangerous Terrorists Act of 2011, bills pending that would close the loopholes Al Qaeda publicized.

 Watch the "What Are You Waiting For?" Ad

 Read the Press Release Announcing the Ad

 Read the Mayor's Statement Responding to the Al Qaeda Propaganda Video

 The Fix Gun Checks Act of 2011 is Introduced in the House of Representatives

 May 6, 2011 - Yesterday members of the U.S. House of Representatives introduced the Fix Gun Checks Act of 2011 (H.R.1781). This legislation will close gaps in the national gun background system that have enabled criminals and other dangerous people – including Tucson shooter Jared Loughner – to easily obtain firearms. The bill was introduced by Rep. Carolyn McCarthy and more than two dozen other members, including Democratic National Committee Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Judiciary Committee Ranking Member John Conyers and Crime Subcommittee Ranking Member Bobby Scott. Senator Chuck Schumer introduced similar legislation in February. The Fix Gun Checks Act of 2011 achieves the goal President Obama set after the Tucson mass shooting, a gun background check system that is "instant, accurate, and comprehensive."

 Read the Press Release Announcing the House Bill

 Following President Obama's Call, Tucson Shooting Victims' Families Endorse Plan to Fix U.S. Gun Background Check System

 March 28, 2011 - Arizona families, civic leaders and elected officials today gathered to endorse legislation based on the Mayors' plan to fix the gun background check system. The press conference, in Tucson, brought together victims of the mass shooting on January 8th that killed 6 people and injured 13 others, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Attendees included Ross Zimmerman, the father of Gabe Zimmerman, Rep. Giffords' staff member who was killed in the shooting; James Fuller; Randy Gardner; Patricia Maisch, who prevented the shooter from reloading; Dr. Peter Rhee, chief of trauma at University Medical Center; and others. The event comes just two weeks after President Obama signaled his support for fixing background checks.

 Read the Press Release

 Key Members of Congress Join Mayor Bloomberg in Announcing House Version of the Fix Gun Checks Act of 2011

 March 15, 2011 - Mayor Michael Bloomberg today applauded President Obama for his recent statements in support of fixing the gun background check system and closing the loopholes that enable criminals to avoid these checks; the President expressed his support in a March 13 letter written to the Arizona Daily Star. During the press conference in Washington D.C., Mayor Bloomberg was joined by New York Congresswoman Carolyn McCarthy, who will introduce the Fix Gun Checks Act of 2011 in the U.S. House, other key House members from across the country.

 Read the Press Release About Today's Announcement

 President Obama Expresses Support for Fixing Background Checks

 March 14, 2011 - In a letter to a Tucson newspaper yesterday, President Obama announced his support for an improved system to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people. The President called for an "instant, accurate, and comprehensive" background check for gun sales, stressing that dangerous individuals should not be able to avoid the background check requirement altogether. His comments add to the growing momentum behind the Mayors Against Illegal Guns Fix Gun Checks campaign, which polls show also has the support of an overwhelming majority of Americans-including gun owners.

 See President Obama's Letter to the Arizona Daily Star

 Read the Statement from the Coalition's Co-Chairs in Response to President Obama's Statements (in PDF)

 Mayors Launch National Drive to Fix Gun Checks

 February 16, 2011 - This morning, Mayor Michael Bloomberg appeared on Good Morning America to launch the National Drive to Fix Gun Checks and raise awareness of gun crime across the country. The Fix Gun Checks billboard truck started in Times Square and keeps a running toll of the numbers of the Americans murdered by guns since the tragic shooting in Tucson, Arizona. The National Drive will criss-cross at least 25 states to meet with mayors, law enforcement, faith leaders, victims of gun violence, sportsmen, and supporters over the next two months.

 Read the press release announcing the tour

 Learn more at www.fixgunchecks.org

 America’s Mayors, Kennedy, and King Families Call on President and Congress to Act

 January 25, 2011 – This morning, Mayors Against Illegal Guns joined with Martin Luther King, III and Kathleen Kennedy Townsend in sending an open letter to President Obama and Members of Congress urging them to fix the nation's criminal background check system. The letter appeared as a full page ad in the January 25th edition of the Washingon Post.

 Download the Print Ad (PDF)

 Take Action at

 Read the Mayors’ Plan to Fix Gun Checks (PDF) Take Action at www.fixgunchecks.org

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What is a one-paragraph summary of the above article?

– The same day seven were shot dead in a Sikh temple in Wisconsin and just weeks after 12 were killed in a Colorado movie theater, shooting victims are appearing in a moving advertisement demanding that President Obama and Mitt Romney come up with a strategy to reduce gun violence. Three survivors of last year's Tucson mass shooting that killed six people and critically injured Rep. Gabby Giffords "demand a plan" from the candidates. "Our leaders gave us a moment of silence, but they haven't given us a plan," they note. "President Obama, Governor Romney: We demand a plan because 48,000 Americans will be murdered with guns during the next president's term. That's three Aurora shootings every day. We need less less silence and more courage." The ad is sponsored by Mayors Against Illegal Guns, and is part of the "Demand a Plan" campaign and petition drive. No word from the candidates.


Article:
The otherwise benign-looking DVD hid a brutal double beheading that was stamped with all the hallmarks of Mexico's ultra-violent drug cartels.

 As the bloody short film booted up in the laptop, a sinister figure in a black balaclava appeared wielding the kind of sub-machine gun favoured by drive-by shooters in the US.

 The hooded man on screen then issued a thinly veiled threat to the audience of two watching the DVD - an American professional gambler, RJ Cipriani, and his Brazilian model and actress wife, Greice Santo.

 Pay up a $2.5m debt to a US cocaine kingpin with links to Mexican and South American drug cartels or a grisly fate awaits, warned the man in the DVD.

 A man holds gun and threatens RJ Cipriani and his wife Greice Santo (pictured right) in the DVD that was sent to them by Owen Hanson. (Supplied) ()

 The film then cut away to a pair of shirtless men. Each is savagely beheaded – one with a chainsaw, the other a butcher's knife.

 In a San Diego courtroom last Friday, Owen "O-Dog" Hanson, the 35-year-old Californian who had sent that vicious DVD to Cipriani and his wife, was sentenced to 21 years and three months. He plead guilty to racketeering conspiracy and conspiracy to distribute drugs - US federal prosecutors also seized upwards of $6.5m of Hanson's cash and property assets.

 The $2.5m Hanson had been trying to shake out of Cipriani in the beheading DVD had an Australian connection, with the seven-figure sum having been lost in 2011 on VIP blackjack tables inside Sydney's The Star casino.

 High-roller Cipriani had blown the millions in drug money – purposefully he claimed - after realising he had been set up to launder Hanson's cocaine profits from his lucrative Australian operation.

 By the time of his arrest in September, 2015, Hanson had smuggled hundreds of kilograms of cocaine into Australia through connections in Mexico and Peru.

 Hanson, a former University of Southern California football player, was able sell a kilogram of cocaine for $230,000 in Australia, compared to $20,000 in Los Angeles.

 RJ Cipriani, who also goes by the name Robin Hood 702, pictured with actress and model wife, Greice Santo. (Supplied) ()

 The cash flooded in, but Hanson needed to clean it. Enter Cipriani, a pro-gambler well known in Las Vegas betting circles. Around the time Hanson was lining his pockets with Australian drug money, Cipriani was branding himself as Robin Hood 702, a kind of philanthropist who would win money from the casinos to give to the poor.

 Cipriani had once dated a woman named Crista Velarde, who unbeknownst to him was now married to Hanson. One day she phoned Cipriani out of the blue, and told him she knew of an American businessman who wanted to bank roll Robin Hood 702's charitable efforts.

 Owen Hanson (left) came from a well-to-do affluent family yet still turned to crime, making millions in an international drug smuggling operation and illegal gambling racket. (Supplied) ()

 After meeting up, Hanson explained to Cipriani that he loved the Robin Hood 702 vision. Hanson said he would give the high-roller his cash and whatever profits Cipriani made he could give away to the needy. The principle sum would go back to Hanson via a casino cashier's cheque.

 The plan sounded solid, straight out of a Martin Scorcese gangster flick, but down in Australia Cipriani got spooked. Hanson delivered several large suitcases and a carry bag containing millions of dollars in Australian fifty dollar bills to Cipriani's plush penthouse suite at the five-star Four Seasons Hotel in Sydney.

 "I can't begin to tell you how many people have offered me money; put up money for me to gamble," Cipriani told nine.com.au, recalling the cash exchange with Hanson.

 "It wasn't unusual in the slightest for someone to say, 'Here's some money go gamble'."

 Crista Velarde, wife of Owen Hanson, appeared in court to watch her husband get sentenced. (Supplied) ()

 But the way Hanson handed over millions of dollars like it was no big thing unsettled Cipriani. So, inside The Star casino's VIP room, Cipriani decided to "leave it with the gambling gods" and lay the maximum bet of $20,000 on every hand. In a couple of days, every dollar of the $2.5m was gone.

 Hanson was furious. He met Cipriani at a bar inside The Star, and he brought with him some extra muscle, a former Australian MMA fighter.

 Cipriani told nine.com.au how Hanson's snarling henchman said he was going to cut the gambler's throat, and that he was to hand over his passport.

 Cipriani went back to his hotel room and called security at The Hilton Hotel, where the hired muscle was staying.

 He falsely told Hilton staff that a man with a gun was inside room 3026. Staff called NSW police, who stormed the room but they didn’t find a gun. Police officers did, however, find a suitcase stuffed full of $702,000.

 'I was so emotional I was trying to hold back tears. I was talking about my wife and what they did to her. It all came back to me, all the emotions all the anger. It finally gave me and my wife closure because there was a fear that Owen Hanson was only going to get five years or ten years.' Rj Cipriani told nine.com.au the emotion of delivering a victim impact statement. ()

 That now infamous cash-packed suitcase marked the start of a joint four-year investigation between the NSW Police and FBI that ended with the take down of Hanson and the dismantling of his drug and gambling operation, O-Dog Enterprise.

 But in the four years leading up to his arrest in the car park of a San Diego golf club, Hanson had tried various methods to try and intimidate Cipriani to hand over the missing $2.5m cash.

 After Hanson had desecrated his mother's grave, Cipriani went to the FBI and became a source, codenamed Jackpot.

 During Hanson's sentencing last week, Cipriani delivered an emotional victim impact statement, often fighting back tears.

 He detailed the threats made against his actress wife, Greice Santo, and the long-lasting impact they had left.

 "Words cannot describe the horror my wife went through watching every frame of the beheading video. It was gruesome," Cipriani said.

 "She is so paranoid still today because of what Owen Hanson put her through. She constantly looks over her shoulder … and she can't check her mail without being worried that another package might be sent by Owen Hanson or one of his crew."

 Crista Velarde, Hanson's dark-haired wife, appeared in court to watch the judge hand down a punishing sentencing of 255 months on her gangster husband.

 Greice Santo was terrorised by Owen Hanson's henchman for years. The actress was sent packages and received continous abusive and threatening phone calls. (Supplied) ()

 Cipriani told nine.com.au he blamed Velarde for what had happened to him and his wife.

 "I trusted her, I dated her years ago. I never thought in a million years that Crista Velarde would set me up with her husband who happened to be a very, very big international drug dealer," he said.

 Cipriani targeted Hanson and Velarde with a personal barb at the end of his victim statement: "While you sit and rot in jail for decades your wife Crista Velarde has moved on with her life, and has been spending your money and having a grand old time."

 When Cipriani first approached the FBI in Philadelphia, they did not believe his story. Undeterred he took it to the San Diego field office and they had launched an investigation.

 Cipriani praised assistant US attorney Andrew Young, FBI agent Brett Fenoglio and two other undercover agents, known only as John and Nick, for believing the information he had on Hanson, and who had orchestrated the downfall of the crime boss's smuggling operation.

 A photo of RJ Cipriani's mother's tombstone, that was vandalised by one of Owen Hanson's crew. This was another example of threats and packages sent to Cipriani and Santo. (Supplied) ()

 "Owen Hanson was at the top of his game. He wasn't a mid-level guy, he was at the top of the food chain for quite some time," Cipriani said.

 "Countless lives have been saved because the drugs that Owen Hanson was selling were destroying and polluting lives globally."

 A total of 20 people in the US who were linked to Hanson's O-Dog operation have pleaded guilty to various charges.

 FOLLOW: Mark Saunokonoko on Twitter

 © Nine Digital Pty Ltd 2018 ||||| OWEN HANSON SENTENCING IN SAN DIEGO FEDERAL COURTHOUSE DECEMBER 15TH AT 2PM

 ALREADY PLED GUILTY TO 20 YEARS MINIMUM MANDATORY pic.twitter.com/1xD2huyy1j — Robin Hood 702 (@robinhood702) December 14, 2017

 The blackjack player was blowing through his money but it wasn’t troubling him. He was anxious to empty his pockets.

 Robert J. Cipriani had thrown out his usual game plan as he worked the neon-splashed rooms of the Star Casino in Sydney in August 2011. In the parlance of high-stakes gambling, Cipriani — a Philadelphia-born card player who dubbed himself “Robin Hood 702″ because he funneled portions of his winnings to philanthropic causes — was known as a “shortstop.”

 It meant he cobbled winnings together with modest bets and refrained from make-it-or-break-it wagers. But in Australia he had decided to “leave it with the gambling gods,” as he would explain later, uncharacteristically dropping maximum bets of $20,000 on every hand he played at the casino’s VIP tables. He had a reason to want to lose. He didn’t want to be involved anymore.

 Within a few days, Cipriani’s reckless run bottomed out: He purposely lost $2.5 million at the tables.

 There was one small problem: It was not his money, but the illegal proceeds of an international drug and gambling operation.

 The man who fronted the cash — Owen “O-Dog” Hanson — was banking on Cipriani to launder the millions through the casino. And now the kingpin was not happy. The card player’s life was about get ugly.

 On Friday, Hanson was sentenced to 21 years in prison in a San Diego courtroom after pleading guilty to racketeering and drug distribution charges, the Los Angeles Daily News reported, ending the career of an unorthodox drug lord.

 Born and raised in Southern California, Hanson had been a walk-on tight end on the 2004 championship-winning University of Southern California football team, a squad coached by current Seattle Seahawks coach Pete Carroll and featuring future NFL players Reggie Bush and Matt Leinart. Hanson’s rise from frat-boy jock to Porsche-driving crime boss began to unravel the day in 2011 gambler Cipriani lost his money in Sydney.

 According to a Rolling Stone article from November 2016, Hanson started slinging drugs when he was at USC.

 “If you wanted something you went to O-Dog,” a former friend told the magazine. “Coke, steroids, you name it.”

 After college, Hanson got heavily involved in sports betting, working as a bookie for clients in Los Angeles.

 “He ran his gambling business like drug dealers run the drug business,” a former customer told Rolling Stone. “If you’re short a little money they’ll kill you — that’s the attitude that he brought. It took all of us off guard. We are all educated . . . white dudes. We thought he was one of us, but he acted like an Italian gangster from Queens.”

 Hanson eventually branched into drug dealing. The federal government would later accuse him of trafficking in cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, MDMA, as well as selling anabolic steroids to pro athletes.

 Court records indicate he collected around him a crew of enforcers with nicknames like “Tank” and “Animal.” Hanson named his crew after himself: “O-Dog Enterprise.” With his ill-gotten proceeds, Hanson built himself an opulent house in Redondo Beach, Calif., with a pool and the walls covered with a silver-plated AK-47 pressed with the Louis Vuitton logo, Rolling Stone reported.

 In June 2011, Hanson reached out to Cipriani, the card player, through a mutual acquaintance. When the two first met in Australia, Hanson presented himself as a legitimate wealthy investor interested in fronting cash for Cipriani’s charity gambling.

 “We went upstairs and he had a suitcase already just sitting there,” Cipriani told the magazine. “He goes, ‘Here, I’m gonna give you a million dollars.’ And I said, ‘Bro, you don’t even know me and you’re gonna give me a million dollars?’

 “And he goes, ‘Yeah, but I heard a lot about you, I have a feeling.’ And I say, ‘But you understand that there’s a chance that I don’t win?’ He goes, ‘Look, I’ll tell you what, I believe in you so much …’ And he opens this cabinetry that literally was stacked with $50 bills in Australian dollars. No locks, no keys, nothing! He grabs some more and says, ‘I’m giving you a million and a half.’ ”

 Hanson’s idea was that the gambler could easily cash drug money into chips at a casino, play for a while, then cash out the winnings in return for a casino check. Hanson told Cipriani he could keep whatever he won for his charity; the rest would go back to Hanson.

 But after playing some with Hanson’s money, Cipriani began to suspect he was being used to funnel dirty cash. When the two men met up in Sydney in August 2011, he told Hanson he was uncomfortable with the arrangement when Hanson tried to hand him $2.5 million in cash for the tables.

 “You have a beautiful wife,” Hanson told the gambler, a subtle threat to Cipriani’s wife back home. “You’re going to do this, you understand?”

 To get out of the situation, Cipriani proceeded to blow through Hanson’s $2.5 million. When Hanson learned his money was gone, however, he began relentlessly threatening the gambler to pay him back. He said he would cut the gambler’s throat in Sydney, bringing along an ex-MMA fighter to intimidate Cipriani, the card player told Australia’s 9 News.

 Back in the States, the threats continued, according to court documents. In 2013, Hanson sent Cipriani and his wife a DVD. The disk included footage of two men being beheaded, one with a knife, the other with a chain saw. A note was included with the DVD: “If you don’t pay us our money, this will happen to you,” according to prosecutors. The couple also spotted a man lurking outside their Santa Monica home.

 Finally, Hanson paid an underling to find Cipriani’s parents’ graves in New Jersey, where the guy defaced the tombstones with red paint, Cipriani told 9 News. Hanson added an image of himself into the pictures of the tarnished graves, then sent them to the gambler.

 After receiving the photos of the defaced graves, Cipriani contacted the FBI, helping investigators with an ongoing case against O-Dog Enterprise. Hanson was arrested in 2015. Eventually 21 other members of the crew were arrested on federal charges related to gambling and drug trafficking.

 In January, Hanson pleaded guilty to racketeering conspiracy and conspiracy to distribute drugs.

 “It is difficult to understand how you got here,” U.S. District Judge William Hayes told Hanson in court Friday. “Other than greed.”

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 ISIS sympathizer who plotted to behead blogger Pamela Geller gets 28 years in prison ||||| Inside the story of Owen Hanson, former USC athlete suspected of heading an international gambling and drug syndicate

 THE GAMBLER AND THE PLAYER

 Robert J. Cipriani arrived in Sydney feeling the way he always did on the eve of a gambling trip: giddy, confident, a hustler with pure intentions. It was August, 2011. Under the pseudonym of Robin Hood 702, Cipriani billed himself as an unorthodox philanthropist: the high stakes blackjack player who used his winnings to benefit those in need. It was an act inspired by his own hardscrabble past in blue-collar Philadelphia, and conceived during regular sojourns to Las Vegas (702 is the city's area code). Though Cipriani kept his identity secret, shielding his face in a baseball cap, aviator sunglasses and the occasional fake beard, he was not exactly inconspicuous in his guise as a workingman's hero. Those seeking his help submitted stories of financial woe to his website, and Cipriani would select a "winner" before hitting the tables, ideally with a camera crew in tow. Fox News had once christened him the "Sin City Savior," and he envisioned himself the subject of similar publicity during his stay in Sydney, where as "Robin Hood" he planned to spend the next few days gambling on behalf of downtrodden locals at the Star Casino.

 Related Ex USC Athlete Owen Hanson Gets 21 Years in Prison for Drug Trafficking Hanson pleaded guilty to racketeering and conspiracy to distribute drugs back in January

 Within an hour of getting settled in his suite at the Four Seasons, however, there was an unexpected knock at the door. Cipriani was greeted by an American businessman he knew by the name of Junior DeLuca. In his late twenties, DeLuca was a figure of shrewd intelligence and imposing physicality, striding into the room with the coiled energy of someone who at any moment might drop to the floor and pound out 100 pushups without breaking a sweat. He had slicked back brown hair, a jawline that could double as a nutcracker, and sculpted shoulders tugging at the pressed seams of his dress shirt. Entering the suite, he was lugging two large suitcases behind him.

 From what Cipriani had gleaned, he and DeLuca had plenty in common. Both men lived in Los Angeles, spent significant time on the Strip in Vegas and shared an irrepressible need for attention, cultivating an air of nebulous, self-manufactured fame. The difference, as became apparent the moment DeLuca unzipped the suitcases, was that while Cipriani promoted himself as a kind of altruistic outlaw, DeLuca's business seemed to be of the more straightforward criminal variety. Inside were crisp bundles of cash totaling $2.5 million in Australian dollars – a staggering pile of money that would come to derail both men's lives in spectacular fashion.

 "Listen," DeLuca said, "I need you to do me a favor."

 Four years later, on September 9th, 2015, a former football player at the University of Southern California named Owen Hanson stepped onto the manicured fairway at the Park Hyatt Aviara Golf Club, in Carlsbad, California, a resort town on the Pacific coast 90 miles south of Los Angeles. Hanson had been a walk-on tight end on the storied Trojans squad that Pete Carroll, today the coach of the Seattle Seahawks, led to repeat national championships in 2004 and 2005. Though Hanson never played a down, his brief stint on the outer periphery of the spotlight left a lasting impression. Ten years removed from college, he referenced his USC days often, maintained a USC email address and led a life that, on the surface mirrored those of better-known former USC teammates, like Reggie Bush and Matt Leinart, who went on to sign multi-million-dollar contracts with the National Football League.

 Hanson, or "O-Dog" as he christened himself as a charismatic fraternity brother at USC, still certainly looked like a formidable athlete. Standing 6-foot-2 and weighing more than 200 pounds, he cut a steroidal silhouette on the golf course, emitting the icy confidence of a man who viewed life as a competition he was used to winning. He drove a white Porsche Panamera, owned property in Mexico and Costa Rica, and routinely partied with athletes like Jeremy Shockey, the rambunctious former tight end who won Super Bowls with the New York Giants and New Orleans Saints. In Hanson's hometown of Redondo Beach, a seaside community in L.A.'s South Bay, he had built himself a sleek residence that featured a lap pool, an ornate "tequila room," and wall décor that included a silver-plated AK-47 embossed with the Louis Vuitton logo. "I go to Vegas a few times each month, and I wanted my house to feel like some of my favorite hotels there," Hanson told an online magazine in 2014, in a profile that showcased the property as an extension of Hanson's success as a real estate developer.

 As Hanson prepared for his 18 holes that September afternoon, agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Organized Crime Squad arrested him for arranging the sale of five kilograms of cocaine and another five of methamphetamine –charges that turned out to be only a preview of the extraordinary case authorities had built against him. In January, Hanson was named in a federal indictment as the unlikely leader of a drug trafficking, sports betting and money-laundering ring called O-Dog Enterprises that stretched from Southern California to Australia. According to authorities, Hanson appears to have used his connections within the world of professional sports – first established back at USC and later fostered in the VIP rooms of Los Angeles clubs and Las Vegas casinos – to bolster his organization. Aside from hanging out with famous athletes while operating Betodog.com, a website that processed illegal wagers on their games, he is accused of coordinating the sale of five grams of cocaine and 15 capsules of ecstasy to "a professional football player" in 2014, according to the indictment; and among the 21 others arrested in January as alleged co-conspirators in Hanson's scheme – a dizzying list of characters that includes an accused drug dealer nicknamed "Tank," a bookie who went by "Jazzy," an enforcer known as "Animal," and a Hollywood private detective – is a former N.F.L. running back named Derek Loville. The winner of a Super Bowl with the San Francisco 49ers in 1994, and two more, in 1997 and 1998, with the Denver Broncos, he now stands accused of selling cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and ecstasy as an Arizona-based member of Hanson's alleged racket.

 George Rose/Getty

 If in his public life Hanson gave the impression of an ambitious young man who worshipped money and emulated pro athletes, his downfall as a kingpin, to judge from court records, stems from a need to develop a more sinister self-image, building his empire through ruthless intimidation, paid beat downs and baroque death threats. In his criminal shadow life, he even went so far as to adopt an alias befitting a mafia don.

 Junior DeLuca, he called himself.

 THE HUSTLE

 The story of how Robert Cipriani became entangled with Owen Hanson – the story, that is, of how a vigilante gambler unwittingly helped bring down a USC athlete turned accused crime boss – can be appreciated from any number of angles: as a clash of misguided egos, a glimpse into the turbulent psyches of former athletes or as a cautionary tale, quintessentially American, about what can happen to a certain breed of individual bent on chasing the sort of dreams that burn especially bright in places like Las Vegas and Los Angeles. It begins, however, in Sydney, where back in 2011 Hanson, inhabiting his alter ego as DeLuca, showed up at Cipriani's room at the Four Seasons with $2.5 million in Australian dollars (worth $2.7 million in U.S. dollars at the time) stuffed into suitcases.

 When Cipriani first shared with the FBI his version of the chain of events leading to that encounter, to say nothing of the macabre absurdity that followed, he says agents at the bureau's Philadelphia office were less than receptive. "Literally," Cipriani explains, "they just laughed." In fairness to the authorities, such a reaction to Cipriani is understandable. A tall and rangy guy who in middle age retains the blustery temperament of an adolescent, he dresses, by this own admission, "like a bum," but portrays himself as floating through a glittering world of comped hotel suites and flights on private jets. He speaks in grandiloquent, expletive-laced monologues that, much like his Robin Hood shtick, tend to be both entertaining and inconceivable. Give him five minutes and he'll tell you about his friendship with the boxer Lennox Lewis; the legs of his wife, a Brazilian actress-model named Greice Santo; and his foolproof solution for preventing future terrorist attacks. The man has a certain off-color charm, but as someone who makes his living hustling, you can't shake the itch that in some hard-to-pin-down way he is trying to play you.

 Yet to spend time with Cipriani is to discover that the most preposterous thing about him may not be the hucksterish, self-mythologizing exterior, but the fact that so much of what he says checks out. When Lennox Lewis served as a pallbearer in Muhammad Ali's funeral earlier this year, the boxer sent Cipriani a photo of the ceremony via text – one that Cipriani happily passed on to the Daily Mail. When Vanity Fair published a two-part exposé on Tiger Woods back in 2010, there was "Robin Hood 702" serving as a prominent source. And in the federal government's sweeping case against Owen Hanson, it is Cipriani, a confidential source nicknamed "Jackpot" by the FBI, who serves as the man who provided some of the most incendiary evidence about how Hanson pursued his extralegal affairs.

 The two had met in June of 2011, when Cipriani first traveled to Sydney to drum up media interest in his forthcoming escapades as Robin Hood. The way Cipriani remembers it, he had heard about Hanson from a woman he dated years ago in L.A. "Mexican, smoking hot, used to being given $25,000 Hermès bags," is Cipriani's description. She mentioned, vaguely but intriguingly, that she knew a wealthy young American who did business in Australia and was a "fan" of Cipriani's. Could she arrange a meeting? When Cipriani arrived in town, he found Hanson waiting for him at the lobby bar of the Four Seasons.

 "Mind you, he's still Junior to me at that point," Cipriani recalls. "We make some small talk and then he says, 'Look, I want to give you some money to gamble with.'" He invited Cipriani to discuss the matter further at a nearby apartment. "Wasn't the overly impressive place that you would think, because he was really well dressed," continues Cipriani. "You know, with fucking cufflinks. Anyways, we went upstairs and he had a suitcase already just sitting there. He goes, 'Here, I'm gonna give you a million dollars.' And I said, 'Bro, you don't even know me and you're gonna give me a million dollars?' And he goes, 'Yeah, but I heard a lot about you, I have a feeling.' And I say, 'But you understand that there's a chance that I don't win?' He goes, 'Look, I'll tell you what, I believe in you so much...' And he opens this cabinetry that literally was stacked with $50 bills in Australian dollars. No locks, no keys, nothing! He grabs some more and says, 'I'm giving you a million and a half.'"

 Gamble with the money, Hanson proposed. Keep what you win for the Robin Hood thing, and return the rest.

 According to court records, Hanson made the bulk of his drug money in Australia, importing over a ton of cocaine into the country and later boasting to an undercover F.B.I. agent that he sold kilos of coke there for $125,000, or more than triple the going rate in the U.S. In Cipriani, he apparently saw a means of solving the problem that has long confounded many successful criminal organizations: a surplus of dirty money, no easy way to clean it. By having Cipriani cash the drug profits into chips, gamble for a bit to avoid suspicion, and then take it back in the form of an easily-transportable casino check, Hanson was attempting to slyly turn the casino into a shell company for laundering money. Cipriani concedes that he was an ideal mark: "If you don't have the reputation of being a high-roller and you try to walk into a casino with millions in cash, they're gonna go, 'Who the fuck is this guy?' But because I'm this famed international gambler, they don't think twice."

 Believing he had stumbled upon a patron of sorts – a personal "whale," in casino terminology – Cipriani took the money and hit the tables at the Star Casino, a palace of curved glass framed by palm trees located a few blocks from the Four Seasons. "I play what they call, in the casino industry, being a shortstop," he says. "I hit and run – $20,000 spot here, $30,000 there. It's the only way you can beat the casinos." Within a few days he had made nearly $300,000, and, per his agreement with Hanson, got a casino check for over $1.7 million.

 The initial signs of trouble began when he phoned Hanson about delivering the funds. "I'm traveling," Hanson said. "Just hang onto the money, and give it to me back in L.A.”

 What followed was a surreal few weeks leading up to Cipriani's second trip to Sydney that August. Back in the States, he did what any gambler with an insatiable appetite for risk would do: He flew to Vegas to see if he could keep his streak going. But after a few days only about $200,000 was left. Panic set in when Hanson called, saying he was back in town and would like his money.

 "Dude, I told you you shouldn't have let me keep it," replied Cipriani, explaining what had happened.

 Hanson was all calm swagger, expressing certainty that Cipriani would turn his luck around. "That belief in me," Cipriani says, "it drew me in." He stayed in Vegas, working the casinos until he had a million dollars. Returning to L.A., he met Hanson for lunch at the Fairmount Miramar Hotel, in Santa Monica, where Cipriani handed Hanson a duffle bag filled with the money. Then it was back to Vegas, but when he called Hanson about an additional $250,000, he was again out of town. This time Hanson instructed Cipriani to give the money to the former fling who had first introduced the two. A week or so later, when Cipriani had another $150,000, Hanson told him to meet another associate, this time in the parking lot of the Fairmount Miramar. These clandestine handoffs of large sums of cash did not, Cipriani says, sit well. But before he could pay back the $100,000 he still owed, he was due to travel again to Sydney as Robin Hood.

 It was then, in August, that Hanson showed up at the Four Seasons with the $2.5 million stuffed into two suitcases.

 Forget the debt, Hanson said, proposing again that Cipriani gamble with the money and return the original in check form. In fact, he told Cipriani he could go ahead and lose up to $600,000 of the $2.5 million, an offer that would have been enticing if it didn't sound a whole lot like blatant money laundering.

 "I'm not comfortable with this," Cipriani said.

 Here is where Cipriani says he got his first glimpse of what U.S. Attorney Laura Duffy described, in the wake of Hanson's indictment, as the "extreme threats of violence employed by the O-Dog Enterprise." A whiff of casual menace creeping into his voice, Hanson mentioned that he knew where Cipriani lived in Santa Monica.

 "You have a beautiful wife," Hanson added, mentioning Greice. "You're going to do this, you understand?"

 As Cipriani relates it, he had no option but to go through with the plan. He claims he didn't know the extent of what Hanson was up to – the gambling business, the drugs, all that would trickle out later – but he felt he was in legitimate danger. So once again he took the money and cashed it into chips in the "cage" at the Star Casino, only this time with a caveat that he kept to himself. Rather than playing "shortstop" out on the floor, he decided to put the whole affair "in the hands of the gambling gods," as he puts it, betting the maximum limit on every hand he played. It was a rash decision with perilous results. The $2.5 million was gone in a matter of days.

 "I'm like, 'Holy shit, I just lost all this guy's money!'" Cipriani recalls. "And, like I told the FBI, that's when everything hit the fan."

 THE RISE

 What possessed Owen Hanson, the product of a coastal enclave of Los Angeles known for its Republican politics and reliable surf breaks, a talented student-athlete at an iconic university, to morph himself into Junior DeLuca, an alleged kingpin so flamboyant he would entrust Cipriani, a gambler who turned a messiah complex into a carnival act, with $4 million in drug profits? It is maybe the most puzzling facet of the case – and one only Hanson can fully explain. But if he has a different version of what went down between him and Cipriani in Sydney, he isn't sharing it. Since his arrest last year, Hanson has been held without bail at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in San Diego, where as inmate number 50825-298, he is facing life in prison on multiple counts of racketeering, money laundering, operating an illegal gambling business and conspiring to distribute drugs. A trial date is currently set for next February. His lawyer, Mark Adams, who recently represented the leader of a Tijuana drug cartel tried in the U.S., says that at this point Hanson has no comment.

 Talk to those who knew him, those who investigated him, as well as a number of people currently indicted in his scheme, however, and you begin to understand Hanson's criminal evolution as the byproduct of his most dominant traits: the competitive impulses, the aspirational streak of a middle class kid raised in proximity to tantalizing opulence, the belief that whatever he had was never quite enough. His upbringing in Redondo Beach was modest – divorced parents, a younger sister – especially in comparison to neighboring towns like Santa Monica and Laguna Beach. His father, who now lives in a $1.5 million home in Montana, where friends say Hanson joined him on occasional fishing trips, was a property maintenance manager for over 30 years. At Redondo Union High School, Hanson played basketball, ran cross country and was a force as an outside hitter on the volleyball squad.

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 Charlie D'Agostino, a Los Angeles real estate developer, has known Hanson since he was 17, when he worked menial jobs on D'Agostino's construction sites. D'Agostino, whose firm 3Ten Development worked on Hanson's Redondo Beach estate, allows that he "wasn't really surprised" by the allegations against Hanson, describing him as ambitious to a fault. "Some of it's probably true," he says, "some is overblown." But he declines to go into detail given that he, too, is also under federal indictment, charged with collecting gambling and drug proceeds on Hanson's behalf. Denying the charges against him, D'Agostino says, "I was the source of Owen not doing illegal things."

 Michael Lee, the architect who designed Hanson's home in Redondo Beach during the same period he was allegedly establishing himself as a criminal, was shocked when he heard about the arrest of his former client. "You got the impression he was a wheeler-dealer type," says Lee. "He was busy, a little bit rushed, always looking at his watch, but always pleasant. Generally speaking, people who are building homes are ambitious and successful. Some you find out are ruthless, but that wasn't Owen."

 You hear this sentiment from plenty of people who knew Hanson, or at least those who knew him only as a young real estate developer – that he was a prototypical bro among men, a flirt in the company of women, hardly vindictive.

 "Was my buddy really living a double life?" asks Jeremy Shockey, the former NFL star. "I guess anything is possible, but I just can't fathom it."

 The two first met over a decade ago at a pool party in Las Vegas, says Shockey, whose Instagram feed is dotted with images of him and Hanson: raising margarita glasses, hanging with NBA star Kris Humphries, surrounded by a bevy of women at a concert. Shockey was introduced to his ex-wife through Hanson, when he brought her to a party Shockey threw on a yacht. The two spent significant time together in Costa Rica, where, as Shockey understood it, Hanson made his money building houses and running a legal gambling business, taking advantage of the nation's lax regulations. "The guy I knew was just a savvy businessman," he says. "Sure, he liked celebrities and hanging at clubs – free bottle service and free models and all that – but drugs? Maybe I'm just gullible, but I didn't pick up on any of that. He never once mentioned going to Australia."

 If there is a period where Hanson began to exhibit certain tendencies that would later draw the attention of law enforcement – a hunger for power, a lust for money, an obsession with status – it is during his years at USC, where he entered the Los Angeles of wealth and extravagance that was just out of reach growing up. There, aside from playing on a football squad where Snoop Dogg was a regular at practices, Hanson was a member of Beta Theta Pi, a fraternity that was banned from pledging on campus. They briefly reformed as an underground society known for throwing wild parties called the Stumpos Raiders – so named, according to rumors, because they were raided by an LAPD officer with the last name Stumpos. It was in this realm that Hanson appears to have emerged as "O-Dog," the campus hustler who was boys with the school's athletic gods. "If you wanted something you went to O-Dog," says someone familiar with the group. "Coke, steroids, you name it."

 Craig Mitchelldyer/Icon SMI/Newscom

 After college, Hanson expanded his campus identity into the larger realm of Los Angeles. He was a member of the MountainGate Country Club, located in the foothills of the Santa Monica Mountains, where he developed a reputation for flaunting the wealth he attributed to his real estate savvy. "The guy loved to gamble, and he gambled big," says a former golfing partner. "A thousand a hole, five thousand a hole. If you went high, he went higher."

 While Hanson had a brush with the law as early as 2007 – an arrest in Orange County that has since been disposed – he cut his teeth as a bookie, according to the FBI. Gambling, of course, has long occupied murky legal terrain in the United States: against the law almost everywhere, yet so tacitly accepted as a pastime that bookies in Vegas regularly see their spreads incorporated into mainstream sports coverage. Serving those who happen not to live in Vegas (or prefer to bet against spreads that differ from those set in Vegas) are a variety of bookies operating outside of the law, fueling a shadow economy that is estimated to bring in between $80 and $380 billion in illegal wagers annually. "We don't make a habit out of busting illegal gambling organizations," says Brett Fenoglio, one of the FBI agents who oversaw the investigation into Hanson. "Technically, they're all over the place: Guys running small-time books at sports bars, buddies betting for fun. For us to get involved it needs to be more nefarious than friends betting on football games when they're out golfing."

 Hanson became part of something more nefarious, according to Fenoglio, when he linked up with an organization called Macho Sports, which in 2011 became the target of an F.B.I. investigation, also led by Fenoglio. Run by Jan and Erik Portocarrero, two brothers from the South Bay who sought shelter from the law by operating their business through servers in Lima, Peru, the ring thrived for over a decade, processing tens of millions in bets and building a loyal client base in Southern California. "Macho was routinely taking wagers of $40,000 and $50,000," says Fenoglio. "Not a lot of guys can do that." Macho also offered gamblers generous lines of credit, luring in customers much the way banks did before the housing crash. "It's like giving a drug user free cocaine," says Fenoglio. "These guys were preying on people with problems." While Macho paid its winners promptly, the group showed little mercy when losers failed to hold up their end of the bargain, employing an enforcer known as "Lurch" to intimidate, and sometimes rough up, those who went into debt.

 Far from being discreet, the Portocarrero brothers displayed their money in peculiar ways. Erik, an aspiring rapper, self-financed a lavishly produced video for a song called "The Clam Eater" in which he saunters through a sea of thong-clad women rapping, with unflinching earnestness, about his love of cunnilingus. (Sample lyric: "I'm a clam eater, a bottom feeder/I use my tongue more than my peeter"). "That video basically tells you everything you need to know about the kind of guys these were," says Fenoglio. In 2013, the Portocarreros were arrested along with 16 others; nearly $14 million was forfeited. But, as is typical with gambling cases, Jan and Erik received relatively light sentences of 18 and 22 months. Though Fenoglio can't talk directly about the case against Hanson while it's being prosecuted, he says that Hanson's organization started as a subsidiary of Macho Sports. His website, betodog.com, was run from the same servers in Peru, and Hanson shared the brothers' predilections for both ostentation and menace. "Owen was a protégé of the Portocarreros," says Fenoglio.

 Avoiding prosecution during the Macho takedown, Hanson appears to have stepped into the void left by the arrests of the Portocarreros, establishing himself as a force in the gambling underworld of Southern California. One self-described "heavy gambler" who placed bets on college and NFL games through Hanson describes him in larger-than-life terms. "The guy was unlike anything we'd ever seen," says the gambler, referring to a crew of friends who also bet through O-Dog. "He was like Leonardo DiCaprio after Titanic – boom, 'I'm huge, fuck you.' Most bookies, they're pretty gentlemanly. Contrary to what you see in the movies, they don't break your legs when you don't pay. They don't want the heat." Hanson, like the Portocarreros, seemed to crave it. "He ran his gambling business like drug dealers run the drug business," the former customer explains. "If you're short a little money they'll kill you – that's the attitude that he brought. It took all of us off guard. We are all educated pussy white dudes. We thought he was one of us, but he acted like an Italian gangster from Queens."

 When this gambler went into debt – "close to $75,000," he says – he learned just how severe Hanson could be when it came to collecting. "He enjoys fucking with people," says the gambler. "The guy threatened me for years, calling at all hours. Honestly, I thought I was going to end up dead."

 Hanson's arrest, according to the gambler, didn't come as a surprise. "We all knew it would burn out for him," he says. "We were actually placing bets on when he'd get busted. The over/under was a year."

 THE FALL

 In Sydney, after Robert Cipriani blew through Hanson's $2.5 million, he spent a few days dodging Hanson's calls as he tried, and failed, to gamble his way out of the hole. Then one afternoon as he was walking through the Star Casino, he was cornered by Hanson. At his side stood an Australian that Cipriani would later learn was a man named Sean Carolan, reportedly a former cage fighter and racehorse trainer who was acting as Hanson's muscle. After Cipriani explained that he'd lost the money, showing proof in the form of a win/loss statement from the casino, he says Hanson and Carolan became irate.

 As someone who describes his life as a series of improbable encounters with questionable individuals, Cipriani had traveled to Australia with what he terms an "insurance policy" – in this case, a reporter for Fox News named Rick Leventhal. Leventhal had been the one, back in 2008, who anointed Cipriani the "Sin City Savior" in a segment for the channel – the only mainstream coverage, as it happens, that Cipriani has received for his Robin Hood endeavors. (He appeared on the network looking like a cartoon bandit: black sunglasses, black cap, black bandana over his face.) The two had forged a mutually beneficial relationship in the years since: Cipriani enjoyed the occasional plug on Fox News, legitimizing his Robin Hood persona, and Leventhal, it appears, enjoyed the perks (potential leads, brushes with B-list celebrities) that came with entering Cipriani's peculiar orbit.

 Now, as Hanson and Carolan demanded that Cipriani follow them back to the nearby Hilton to pick up the next installment of cash, Cipriani played his ace. "I can't leave with you," he said. "I got a guy from Fox News doing a story on me."

 This wasn't exactly true: Leventhal, according to Cipriani, was enjoying a lavish gambling vacation paid for by an occasional subject. But the specter of a journalist lurking about was enough to give Hanson and Carolan pause. They told Cipriani to meet them in a few hours, giving Cipriani time to concoct an exit strategy.

 "So I'm frantically calling Rick, who's just been gambling and refuses to pick up his phone," recalls Cipriani. "Finally, I get a hold of him and say, 'Get your shit and meet me at the Four Seasons.' He's like, 'Dude, I'm down 12 grand!' I say, 'I'll give you 12 grand!' He says, 'What happened?' I say, 'The reason why I fucking brought you happened.'" (Leventhal turned down numerous requests to comment, but Cipriani provided flight and hotel records, as well as text messages between the two, corroborating Leventhal's presence in Sydney.)

 When Cipriani received a call from Carolan demanding that Cipriani meet in room 3026 of the nearby Hilton Hotel, Cipriani instead took a cab to the airport with Leventhal, calling Hilton security en route and reporting – anonymously, falsely – that there was man with a gun in room 3026. Though he wouldn't know it for years, at that moment he had planted the seeds for what would evolve into a sweeping international investigation. When the police arrived, they did not find a gun, but they did find Sean Carolan and a suitcase filled with $702,000 in Australian currency. (A curious sum, Cipriani points out, given that he says it was intended for him – a gambler who calls himself Robin Hood 702.)

 When asked by police about the money, Carolan reportedly claimed it belonged to an American businessman named Owen Hanson who had invested in Carolan's fledgling weight-loss business. This explanation sounded dubious to the authorities, who seized the money. As they began looking into the matter, a number of suspicious personalities came out of the woodwork, shedding light on the company Hanson was keeping in Australia. First, an ostentatious concert promoter named Andrew McManus (pasty, bloated, known for bringing Kiss and Fleetwood Mac to Australia) claimed the money was in fact his – the proceeds of a Lenny Kravitz concert that Hanson was helping him "sneak" into Australia from New Zealand. Then McManus changed his story, saying the money had been delivered to Hanson by Craig Haeusler, a mutual friend who happened to be a convicted drug kingpin in Australia, and who was reportedly giving it to Hanson to repay him for helping fund a ZZ Top concert. Haeusler, when interviewed, told authorities that he and Hanson bet on NFL games together in the U.S. In 2012, when Hanson was eventually questioned by Australian authorities via video-link from the Beverly Hills Police Department, he was not exactly coy on the subject of the mysterious cash, exhibiting the cocky manner that would later get him into trouble with an FBI undercover operative.

 "Do you want me to tell you the full story of how basically this money was laundered?" he allegedly asked agents, adding, as if to legitimize himself, "I deal with a lot of professional athletes."

 Yet, if Hanson was concerned about being tied to the investigation in Australia, to say nothing of the one being conducted into the Macho Sports empire, he didn't show it back in America. His business continued to thrive with a reliance on threats and intimidation – much of it, according to court records, directed at Cipriani. First there were phone calls, dozens of them, demanding that he pay back the $2.5 million he lost. And then there were threats, subtle at first, and then increasingly chilling. Flowers were sent to Greice, Cipriani's wife. A man in a van – later identified as Jack Rissell, the enforcer referred to in the indictment as "Animal" – was often stationed outside Cipriani's Santa Monica home. "Just lurking," says Cipriani, "and scaring the shit out of me and my wife."

 In July of 2012, Cipriani flew to Costa Rica to discuss a payback plan with Hanson. It didn't go well. Cipriani got spooked when he noticed that the man Hanson sent to pick him up was carrying a gun, and left the country without meeting Hanson. "It made me think," Cipriani says, "that he was trying to whack me." Meanwhile, back in the States Hanson's threats were only becoming more disturbing. That fall, around the same time that Hanson was being questioned by Australian police, Cipriani received a photograph of his parents' graves in a cemetery outside of Philadelphia; the tombstones were splattered in blood red paint, and photoshopped into the image was one of Hanson himself, wearing a Mexican wrestling mask and holding a shovel, as if to imply that Cipriani would soon be joining his family if he failed to pay. A few months later, in January of 2013, Cipriani received a DVD in the mail from Hanson that contained gruesome footage of two men being beheaded with a machete and chainsaw. Included with the DVD was a message: "If you don't pay us our money, this will happen to you."

 By then, through his own gumshoe detective work, Cipriani had discovered that Junior DeLuca was in fact Owen Hanson. He knew about his days at USC, his friendships with pro athletes. This time, he decided to contact the FBI's San Diego branch. They had reason to listen. The office had just finished their takedown of the Macho Sports empire, during which Hanson's name had popped up. At the time they figured him for a minor player, but now a new investigation, this one focused solely on Hanson, was opened.

 "Is it not fucking crazy?" says Cipriani. "Had I not gone to the feds, this motherfucker would still be out there!"

 OUT-HUSTLED

 On October 18th, 2016, Hanson's lawyers filed a pre-trial motion that suggests an effort to undermine the government's case by discrediting Cipriani as a witness. By highlighting Cipriani's own past brushes with the law – namely a 2006 conviction for insurance fraud that Cipriani chalks up to a complex family feud – the defense portrays Cipriani as an established charlatan with a history of exploiting others for financial gain. They imply, in no uncertain language, that Cipriani was not an unwitting mark in Hanson's scheme, but an active participant, questioning why Cipriani has so far avoided prosecution for the $1.5 million he successfully laundered through the Star Casino back in June of 2011. "The inescapable fact is that Mr. Cipriani was an important, yet unindicted, member of the alleged conspiracy," the motion reads.

 It is a curious line of defense: one hustler conceding, in essence, that he was outwitted by another. Cipriani, with his insatiable hunger for attention and lofty vision of himself as a "famed international gambler," may not be the most reliable narrator, but given that he recklessly blew through $2.5 million of Hanson's money a few weeks after he nearly gambled away $1.5 million on a stint in Vegas, neither does he seem to be the professional extortionist Hanson's lawyers suggest. More critically, while Cipriani became an improbable catalyst for a federal investigation, it is what the FBI subsequently discovered that constitutes the most convincing evidence for their case against Hanson.

 Remove Cipriani from the equation, for instance, and you still have Betodog.com, the sports betting site Hanson established as a subset of the Macho Sports regime. You have numerous text messages from Hanson, all post-dating his interactions with Cipriani, instructing various runners to collect and deliver gambling proceeds. You have his communications with Luke Fairfield, a San Diego accountant also under indictment, that suggest a variety of Breaking Bad-like schemes (shell companies, structured bank transactions) to avoid scrutiny of Hanson's finances. You have Hanson emailing Jack Rissell, the enforcer, in order to ask if a delinquent gambler in Minnesota was dealt with properly. "I paid 2K for a smack down," the message, from 2013, reads, making it clear that Cipriani was not the only target of his wrath. You have at least $5 million scattered in bank accounts, and an IRS agent's conclusion, from analyzing only the books of three alleged bookies, that Hanson generated income of $323,179 in just three months in 2012, giving a sense of his operation's scope.

 While the investigation into Hanson began as an inquiry into illegal betting, it is in his alleged role as a drug dealer that he faces the most severe punishment. Here, too, the most damning evidence is disconnected from Cipriani. You have Hanson, caught on a wiretap in 2014, praising a "new batch" of GHB, a controlled sedative commonly referred to as "liquid ecstasy," received by "Tank," the nickname of Giovanni Brandolino, the dealer indicted in the scheme. "Strong and makes me real horney [sic]," Hanson noted in a text, and on November 17th, 2014 you have Hanson directing Brandolino to sell cocaine and ecstasy to "a current professional player then located in Nashville, Tennessee," a day the Titans played the Pittsburgh Steelers. You have him bragging to an undercover agent about how he sold kilograms of coke in Australia for $125,000, not to mention the five kilograms of cocaine and another five of methamphetamine that initially got him locked up. Rufus Rhone, who conducted that deal with an undercover agent, allegedly on Hanson's behalf, has already pleaded guilty; he is currently serving a sentence of six years.

 Meanwhile, in Australia, a number of arrests have been made in connection to the $702,000 found back in 2011, including those of Andrew McManus, the concert promoter, who in August pleaded guilty to perverting justice by lying about the money, avoiding the more serious charges of knowingly participating in a criminal group. His lawyer, Michael Croke, who also represented Hanson in Australia, has been arrested for his role. Most recently, in August, a 31-year-old Australian named Jonathan Fagan was charged with importing 88 kilos of cocaine from the United States between 2014 and 2015 as part of the same alleged syndicate.

 Dan Himbrechts/Redux

 Still, whether the case goes to trial in February or Hanson opts for a plea deal, questions hover at the edges of the affair. Was Hanson truly a cunning kingpin, as charged by the federal government? Or was he more of a wannabe Tony Soprano, a striving, status-seeking braggadocio undone by a terminal need to live a life that rivaled those of his former USC teammates turned professional football stars? As serious as the charges against him are, Hanson's "organization" seems ad-hoc at best, more a loose assemblage of desperate souls than a cartel of hardened career criminals. Take Rissell, who wouldn't comment on his alleged role as an enforcer; he currently works as a Ford salesman in Sacramento, and, according to an acquaintance, was living out of the van that Hanson paid him to park outside the home of Cipriani. Similarly, Daniel Portley-Hanks, the private investigator currently facing up to 10 years in prison for conducting background checks and coordinating threats for Hanson, remains confused over his current status. Seventy-years-old, overweight, diabetic and prone to breaking down in tears when talking about the case, he has worked for the FBI in the past, helping the agency take down, of all things, a bookmaking operation run by the Gambino crime family.

 "I had no idea what this asshole was up to!" Portley-Hanks says of Hanson, who, at least until Portley-Hanks's own arrest, he thought was a real estate developer who hired him to do routine background checks on business associates. "We'd meet at a Starbucks on Wilshire Boulevard for Christ's sake," he goes on, adding that, as a licensed private eye, such work was legal. "The guy paid me between $50 and $500 a pop over PayPal from a USC address. It didn't exactly scream criminal mastermind." Over a period of 38 months, Portley-Hanks was paid a total of $4,081.82 for his services. "They're lumping me in as being part of some multi-million-dollar conspiracy, and I'm living in a one room apartment in Studio City on a fixed income?" he says. "Does that make sense to you?"

 Portley-Hanks does admit that he helped Hanson with the photo of Cipriani's parents' graves splattered in paint. But, in his description, the whole thing was less the menacing "threat" as portrayed in the indictment than a collegiate prank concocted by an amped-up ex-frat brother with far too much time and money on his hands. "Part of the reason I took that job, aside from being broke, is that my brother lived in New Jersey, about 50 miles from where Cipriani's parents are buried," he says. "It was like a free trip to see my family." When he drove across the country, he claims, it was only to take a photo of the tombstones, for which Hanson paid him $5,000. "Then, when I emailed it to Owen, he asks if I'll pour some red paint on it. Another $2,000. This was the day before Hurricane Sandy hit, so I'm thinking it will just wash away. But I mistakenly used waterproof paint when I meant to buy the water soluble stuff."

 Back in L.A., when he met Hanson at the Starbucks to receive his payment, Portley-Hanks says Hanson asked if he could be photo-shopped into the image for an additional fee. "So we drive over to this park behind the La Brea Tar Pits, and he pulls a Mexican wrestling mask and a shovel out of the back of his car," Portley-Hanks recalls. "All I'm thinking at that point is: This is one whacky motherfucker. But as a private eye you come across a lot of those. I figured the whole thing was two rich assholes playing games, like the kind of mindless threats that go back and forth over Twitter."

 Indeed, the most remarkable aspect to the case may be that Hanson's frat-boy antics and self-image as a Californian Pablo Escobar – manifesting in an unwavering obsession with hazing Cipriani and ultimately undercutting his otherwise shrewd approach to building a phenomenally lucrative illegal enterprise – is in the end the reason he sits in a prison cell today. Which is not to say that Cipriani has emerged from the feud untarnished. Though he wasn't indicted as a player in the laundering scheme – in part, he supposes, because of a proffer letter he signed with the Department of Justice before sharing information with F.B.I. – his association with Hanson has resulted in a lifetime ban from the casinos that once sent private jets for him. If he wants to play blackjack today, he must do so in "two-bit Indian reservation casinos," putting his persona as Robin Hood into early retirement.

 "I was the one who brought this motherfucker to justice, and this is what I get?" he says. But he is quick to add that, in the wake of Hanson's arrest, he has found a new outlet for his avenging impulses, reinventing himself as a freelance source for FBI. "Dude, I'm working on other cases right now that are even crazier than this one," he says. "Literally, you wouldn't believe it if I told you." |||||Summary:

– Owen "O-Dog" Hanson played on the same championship-winning USC football team as future NFL stars Reggie Bush and Matt Leinart, but he would ultimately take a very different career path. The 35-year-old California man was sentenced to more than 21 years in prison Friday after pleading guilty to racketeering and conspiracy to distribute drugs, reports the Washington Post. His fall from grace is a wild tale: While at USC in 2004, Hanson began selling drugs, including cocaine and steroids, Rolling Stone previously reported. After college, he started working as a bookie in Los Angeles. Years later, his wife would tell a former boyfriend, professional gambler RJ Cipriani, that Hanson wanted to put up millions of dollars to fund his efforts at casinos in Australia, per 9 News. The money was to be returned with a casino check, though Cipriani could keep any winnings. Authorities say it was a scheme aimed at hiding money from Hanson's illegal dealings in Australia, where he could sell cocaine for ten times as much as in LA. Cipriani claims he figured this all out and was purposefully reckless at the casino tables to get out of the arrangement; he ended up losing $2.5 million. But his escape plan wasn't that easy. Cipriani says Hanson threatened him and his wife, including by sending them a video of two men being beheaded. "If you don't pay us our money, this will happen to you," an attached note read, according to prosecutors. The US gambler eventually went to the FBI and Hanson was arrested in 2015 in a joint operation with Australian police. He pleaded guilty in January, and has now been ordered to forfeit $5 million in assets. More than 20 of Hanson's associates have also been charged with crimes related to gambling and drug trafficking.