SOURCE: Associated Press

(San Antonio, Texas) — A well-known local poker player has struck a plea deal in a case involving an online bookmaking operation and will forfeit more than $2.2 million of purported poker winnings.

Richard Henry Lee, who placed sixth in 2006 at the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas, on Tuesday entered a no contest plea to the misdemeanor charge of keeping a place for gambling. Four of Lee's employees entered the same plea.

Lee and three employees will give up 80 percent of the money, or $2.5 million total, that San Antonio police seized in raids last year.

Police called Lee's home the "nerve center" of the sports booking and betting operation and named him as the bookie. They raided his house as part of an investigation into a sports betting Web site that pretending to be offshore.

"I'm glad it's over," Lee said. "Now I need to go win another poker tournament."

One of Lee's lawyers, Alan Brown, said the money Lee is giving up was from the nearly $2.7 million he won at the Las Vegas tournament.