SweepsCoach's three managers plead guilty to a $14 million gambling operation
James Mecham, Kurt Stocks and Heidi Edwards, the managers behind a series of businesses collectively known as SweepsCoach, pleaded guilty in June 2025 to operating an illegal gambling business that facilitated internet sweepstakes cafes across California and Arizona. Between January 2012 and November 2017, roughly $14 million in gaming proceeds was deposited into accounts the defendants controlled. Each faces up to five years in prison at sentencing.
- Year
- 2025
- Where
- United States
- Outcome
- Convicted
- Reported loss
- $14.0 million
- Victims
- Not stated in the sources
- Schemes
- Sweepstakes casino scams
- Last reviewed
- 2026-10-10
The facts, as recorded
- James Mecham of Orem, Utah, and Kurt Stocks and Heidi Edwards, both of El Dorado Hills, California, pleaded guilty on June 3, 2025 to operating an illegal gambling business.
- The three managers operated a series of businesses collectively known as SweepsCoach, based in El Dorado Hills, that marketed the gaming operation, contracted with internet cafes for access to the SweepsCoach portal, and helped set up and service the gaming terminals.
- Players used credits to play slot-machine-style games on a video screen; winning credits could be exchanged for cash at the internet cafe.
- SweepsCoach clients deposited the cash owed from the illegal gaming directly into bank accounts controlled by the defendants; between January 1, 2012 and November 7, 2017, approximately $14 million in gaming proceeds was deposited into accounts controlled by Mecham and Stocks.
- Gross gaming receipts from California and Arizona locations using SweepsCoach's system totalled approximately $11 million.
- Each defendant faces a maximum statutory penalty of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine; sentencing was scheduled for October 21, 2025 before US District Judge John A. Mendez.
- The investigation was conducted jointly by IRS Criminal Investigation, the FBI, the California Department of Justice's Bureau of Gambling Control and the California Franchise Tax Board; Assistant US Attorney Heiko Coppola prosecuted the case.
Why this case matters
This is the most recent criminal prosecution of the classic cafe-era sweepstakes model on this page, confirming the same mechanism, software provider, internet cafe hosts, and cash funnelled directly into the defendants’ own accounts, was still running as recently as 2017 and still drawing federal charges as recently as 2025.
A six-year, two-state operation
Unlike a single storefront, SweepsCoach was a service business: it supplied the software “portal”, onboarded internet cafes across two states as clients, and helped set up and maintain their terminals. The nearly $14 million that moved through accounts the three managers controlled over almost six years shows how lucrative that backend role was, separate from whatever any individual cafe kept for itself.
The caveat
Mecham, Stocks and Edwards pleaded guilty, which is a conviction under federal law; none of this page’s language about their conduct should be read as an unproven allegation. Sentencing was scheduled for October 21, 2025. The publicly available record located for this page does not yet confirm the sentence each defendant actually received; this page will be updated once that outcome is documented.
Sources
- Managers of El Dorado Hills company SweepsCoach plead guilty to operating an illegal gambling business. Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation (mirroring the US Attorney's Office, Eastern District of California release). Accessed 2026-10-10. Supports: All defendant names, locations and roles, the operating period, the $14 million and $11 million figures, the guilty plea date, the maximum statutory penalty, the sentencing date and judge, and the investigating agencies.