{"id":253851,"date":"2025-09-25T15:07:16","date_gmt":"2025-09-25T15:07:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/253851\/"},"modified":"2025-09-25T15:07:16","modified_gmt":"2025-09-25T15:07:16","slug":"ex%e2%80%91jaguars-employee-who-stole-millions-from-team-pleads-not-guilty-to-organized-fraud-in-duval-county","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/253851\/","title":{"rendered":"Ex\u2011Jaguars employee who stole millions from team pleads not guilty to organized fraud in Duval County"},"content":{"rendered":"

DUVAL COUNTY, Fla.<\/strong> \u2013 Former Jacksonville Jaguars employee Amit Patel<\/a>, who is currently serving 6 1\/2 years in a federal prison for stealing more than $22 million from the team over three years, appeared in Duval County court on Thursday morning.<\/p>\n

During his arraignment, Patel pleaded not guilty to one count of organized fraud and requested a trial before a jury.<\/p>\n

In July, Patel, 32, was transferred from Federal Prison Camp Montgomery, a minimum-security federal prison, and admitted into the Duval County jail to face the new state charges, according to jail records. He was originally charged with six counts of grand theft. But those charges were dropped and he\u2019s now only charged with one count of organized fraud.<\/p>\n

RELATED | <\/b>FanDuel agrees to pay Jaguars roughly $5M to offset losses from ex-employee\u2019s theft, AP source says<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

The charge could add to the sentence he is already serving.<\/p>\n

Federal prosecutors say Patel used the stolen millions to live a \u201clife of luxury\u201d that included lavish trips on private jets, a country club membership, a luxury watch, and Jaguars and sports memorabilia worth tens of thousands of dollars. They asked the court to sentence Patel to seven years in prison.<\/p>\n

But Patel\u2019s attorneys argued that the vast majority of the money stolen from the Jaguars fueled Patel\u2019s online gambling addiction and asked for a lighter sentence.<\/p>\n

The judge sentenced Patel to 78 months in prison plus three years of supervised release following his prison time.<\/p>\n

Patel, who pleaded guilty in December to wire fraud and illegal monetary transactions, could have been sentenced to up to 30 years in prison.<\/p>\n

Prosecutors said Patel spent more than $5 million of the stolen money on \u201cpersonal expenses,\u201d and released a long list of items purchased by Patel, along with photos of him on vacation.<\/p>\n

Patel\u2019s attorney said his client suffers addictions to gambling, alcohol and drugs but has worked hard to turn his life around, getting sober, going to meetings, and even starting a Gamblers Anonymous chapter in Jacksonville Beach.<\/p>\n

MORE | <\/b>\u2018What I did was illegally borrow money\u2019: Ex-Jaguars worker talks about his gambling addiction, lawsuit against FanDuel<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

Patel told the court, in front of friends and family who packed the courtroom to support him, he was \u201csickened with shame,\u201d saying he can never fully convey how sorry he is to those he hurt. He said his sobriety has given him clarity, and he is committed to use his story to help others who are struggling.<\/p>\n

The court also ordered Patel to pay more than $21 million in restitution, paying $250 a month once he\u2019s released from prison. Patel\u2019s attorney in court suggested his client was spending so much money on stuff so he could resell it to keep gambling.<\/p>\n

Patel\u2019s pre-trial hearing was set for Oct. 30.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2025 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DUVAL COUNTY, Fla. \u2013 Former Jacksonville Jaguars employee Amit Patel, who is currently serving 6 1\/2 years in…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":253852,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5136],"tags":[5229,99645,8314,3188,723,7310,8013,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-253851","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-amit-patel","10":"tag-duval-county","11":"tag-fl","12":"tag-florida","13":"tag-jacksonville","14":"tag-jaguars","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-united-states-of-america","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","19":"tag-us","20":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115265565393699874","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=253851"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253851\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/253852"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=253851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=253851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=253851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}