It's a pretty entertaining opinion to read. Essentially, there was no way that the defendants could argue they didn't do the crime, because one of the participants' girlfriends informed the casino even before the contest ended. They mainly argued about the format of the indictment, something the court took less than seriously.
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The court had "no problem concluding that Knutson’s and Moore’s behavior—stuffing the promotional barrels with over 9,000 fake entries, exponentially increasing their odds of winning—can only be construed as a tricky scheme to dupe the casino out of its money." Further, "It is true that the rules do not specifically prohibit the submission of fake ... entry forms, but that does not mean the casino condoned counterfeiting. As the Latin lovers might say, expressio unius est exclusio alterius—that is, by listing the proper avenues for receiving entry forms, one should logically infer that the casino meant to exclude other avenues."
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"The defendants maintain that they were open and honest about their behavior-—they used their real names on the forms and Knutson gave the casino his real name and social security number to claim the prize—which, they contend, belies any intent to steal from the casino. But the duo had to accurately provide this information to collect the prize money, so this honesty says little about their intentions. Meanwhile, their other behavior suggests that they knew they were up to no good. They furtively staggered the submission of the fake forms over multiple days and asked two other people to help stuff the barrels."
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The court concludes they were properly convicted under federal law.

The Judge was probably paid off, maybe even the 10,000..Or maybe he is Big Cheif..LOL

Something seems a little off here.
When someone pulls something like this anywhere else, don't they just get "disqualified" and thats the end of it?
The "courts" lacking for work or what??

10 months in prison??? You have got to be kidding me. Funny from a place that rips off people daily..