Utah Charges Calci with Criminal Indictment for Promoting Illegal Gambling

The Utah state prosecutor has criminally charged the prediction market platform Calci and its co-founders with promoting illegal online gambling. The Utah prosecutor filed criminal charges against Calci and co-founders CEO Tarek Mansour and COO Luana Lopez Lara in the Salt Lake County District Court. The charges include one count of repeated illegal acts, twelve counts of promoting online gambling, and one count of promoting general gambling, totaling fourteen counts. Among these, thirteen are felonies, and one is a misdemeanor. The indictment includes details of the investigators participating in contracts related to sports events such as football and baseball twelve times in September. The Utah prosecutor claims that Calci encouraged gambling by allowing transactions for residents within the state. Utah Attorney General Derek Brown stated, "Gambling, whether it involves betting, operating games, or promoting them, is illegal in Utah," adding, "Just because it is called a 'prediction market' or registered federally does not place it above the law." Calci rebutted the indictment as a "political overreaction" and stated it would contest the charges in court. Prior to this criminal indictment, Utah had filed a civil lawsuit against Calci for violating state gambling laws through contracts related to sports, elections, and political events. The CFTC has sued in federal court to prevent Utah from applying state law to federally registered contract markets like Calci. The issue at hand is whether prediction market contracts should be viewed as financial products subject to federal regulation or as gambling that can be regulated by the state.