Betcha loses a battle; Not the war?
Betcha is (was) an honor-based peer-to-peer betting service based in Seattle. On July 9, the Washington State Gambling Commission swept into Betcha’s offices, Gestapo style, confiscating everything, right down to their Programming PHP manual. Founder Nick Jenkins is now staring straight in the face of our country’s unconscionable forfeiture laws: you know, the ones that give law enforcement the right to sell Nick’s stuff on eBay and keep the proceeds, without ever charging him with a crime.
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported on the raid. The vast majority of the commenters sided with Betcha, urging Washington State officials to find better uses for their time and tax money, lamenting Washington’s ever-growing “Nanny State” credentials, and decrying the seemingly corrupt and hypocritical gambling politics involved.
To Nick and other Betcha employees and investors: Thank you for taking this risk and putting your stake in the ground, even if the current outcome is not what you’d hoped for. I hope you have the wherewithal to see this through to your day in court so that, if nothing else, we can get some clarity in the law. Here’s to hoping you’ve simply lost a battle and not the war.
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