Sports betting is strictly controlled in the US, but legal in the UK. Intercash Ltd. I.O.M. and American Sports Ltd. are licensed gambling businesses in the Isle of Man and England respectively. They advertised to Americans on the web and insisted that their businesses were legal to use since all bets were “placed” in the UK, albeit the sporting events were mostly US professional and college football and basketball games and payment was made to a New Jersey account. The New Jersey company was needed to maintain the local bank account, accepting wire transfers from US gamblers and transferring them abroad.
Judge Theodore McKee wrote:
“American courts have jurisdiction ‘over proscribed acts done in this country’ that have the required nexus to activities elsewhere. We therefore find no merit in [the] jurisdictional challenge to this [action] proceeding over New Jersey property based upon conduct occurring in New Jersey. It may well be true that British citizens and British companies will be affected by this [action] in New Jersey. This does not mean that the law of New Jersey or the law of the United States is being applied to those citizens or companies.”
Judge McKee granted the US Government the authority to seize funds from the New Jersey company after it showed that the “the forfeiture action is predicated solely upon conduct that occurred in New Jersey. [The English and Isle of Man companies] are therefore actually arguing that the laws of England insulate them from forfeiture based upon their conduct in New Jersey. We reject that argument.”
The Isle of Man, Antigua and the Seychelles last week dropped out of the OECD’s list of official "tax havens" after agreeing to greater transparency. The 30-member Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development de-listed the islands along with 32 other former tax havens.
There are now only seven remaining havens that will not co-operate in the OECD’s drive to improve rules on disclosure of information to tax officials in other nations: Andorra, Liechtenstein, Liberia, Monaco, the Marshall Islands, Nauru and Vanatu. Countries refusing to meet OECD standards could face financial sanctions from April 2003.