Former Gambino outlet says Chauncey Billups could have been blackmailed by mob in NBA poker scandal

A former enforcer for the Gambino crime family believes the Mafia could be up to ‘something’. Chauncey Billups -And an NBA coach may be as much a victim as the gamblers he cheated.

“For them to do that, maybe they knew someone and they were asking them for a favor…he had a wife he was cheating on, or they caught him snorting coke, or something, they caught him somehow,” John Allett theorized, although there is no public evidence to suggest he engaged in these behaviors.

Or the 49-year-old detainee Portland Trail Blazers It could be the coach Ask for help from the mobAlit suggested, then found himself in over his head.

“Either they are blackmailing him or he has asked for a favor in the past… and they use him slowly and then pull his neck, you know, choke him a little and tell him to do this or another,” he said.

the The Ministry of Justice charged 31 people Wednesday — including Billups, Terry Rozier of the Miami Heat and former Cleveland Cavalier Damon Jones — in a massive illegal gambling operation involving the Gambino, Bonanno, Genovese and Lucchese crime families.

The FBI accused Billups and Jones of acting as “Face cards“To lure gamblers into rigged, mob-run card games that operate outside of the game 80 Washington Pl. In Greenwich Village.

Professional athletes and celebrities are often drawn to the mob, the former Gambino man said, because the underworld provides excitement in their high-profile lives.

“We would stay with a lot of the actors, when John (Gotti) would come in, DeNiro would come in, Steven Seagal, Mickey Rourke,” he said.

a fan Who spent 14 years behind bars As for the convictions related to six murders and at least 37 shootings, he said the mob often used a combination of coercion and gifts to ensnare people.

“They offered women, drugs, whatever they wanted,” he said.

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He explained that Mafia members had a “slow process” to lure honest people into their clutches, adding that Billups and Rosier could have been groomed and eventually forced to participate in card games.

“You don’t just dive in, you work slowly on the guy,” Allitt said. “I had an investigator with me. Phil BaroniHe was a tight cop.

“I started by bringing him to Atlantic City. He loved to gamble, and before you knew it he became my bookmaker partner, then he became my drug partner, then he became my killer.”

Alite rejected the idea of ​​Pelops getting involved to get money, claiming that he was already wealthy enough to not care about money.

“It’s ridiculous to think he’s just there to make $50,000, it doesn’t quite make sense.”

Billups, through his lawyer Chris Haywood, denied the allegations and vowed to fight to clear his name.

“Anyone who knows Chauncey Billups knows that he is an honest man, and honest men do not cheat and defraud others,” Haywood said in a statement.

Haywood did not respond to The Post’s request for comment.