On Wednesday, the Iowa Department of Public Safety released a statement defending its agents’ actions in the sports gambling investigation involving student-athletes at the University of Iowa and Iowa State.
“We believe the evidence was obtained in a constitutionally permissible manner,” the statement read. “Ultimately it is up to the courts to decide. We want to reassure Iowans that the Department always strives to scrupulously uphold the laws and constitutions of the United States and the State of Iowa.”
On Jan. 22, court documents alleged that special agent Brian Sanger of the Iowa Department of Public Safety’s Division of Criminal Investigations conducted his investigations into illegal student-athlete gambling without a warrant.
The statement said the department traditionally does not comment on active investigations “in an effort to ensure these matters are appropriately addressed by our justice system rather than the media.”
Lawyers representing Iowa State football defensive lineman Isaiah Lee wrote that DCI agents monitoring gambling was the result of Sanger conducting a warrantless search on the UI and ISU campuses.
“He initially used Kibana to place a warrantless GeoFence around a freshman/sophomore dorm at the University of Iowa to investigate underage gambling without any tips, complaints, or evidence that underage gambling was occurring,” Lee’s lawyers wrote.
Kibana is a software used for data visualization. A geofence is a virtual fence or perimeter that can be used to track digital movement within its boundaries.
The lawyers wrote that Sanger’s superiors denied him when he approached them requesting permission to continue the investigation.
According to the filing, Sanger then targeted a UI athletic facility that is restricted to athletes, coaches, and other staff, again doing so without a warrant. When he asked his superiors for approval, they gave it, but the agents proceeded to then target other facilities and private citizens without reasonable cause.
The statement cited Iowa Administrative Rule 491-13.5, which requires “the sportsbooks to implement location detection procedures to reasonably detect and dynamically monitor the location of a player attempting to place any wager” and to notify account holders about information being gathered and shared.
The DPS also cited Iowa Code section 99F.7A, which requires sports wagering licensees to “employ reasonable steps to prohibit coaches, athletic trainers, officials, players, or other individuals who participate in an authorized sporting event that is the subject of sports wagering, from sports wagering.”
Fifteen current and former UI and ISU athletes have been charged since the investigations into alleged sports betting began in May 2023.
Hawkeye sixth-year defensive tackle Noah Shannon was not criminally charged because he was 21 years old, the legal gambling age in Iowa, when he bet. He allegedly bet on one Iowa basketball game, and the NCAA suspended him for the entire 2023 season.