Following a 15-month investigation, N.Y. authorities
"began rounding up" 16 "suspects" yesterday and Sunday --
including eight current and former ticket agents for the
Yankees and one for the Mets -- who were charged with
"helping scalpers sell more than" $300,000 worth of game
tickets this year alone, according to NEWSDAY. Manhattan DA
Robert Morgenthau and NY AG Eliot Spitzer said that the
ticket agents "took tens of thousands of dollars in bribes
from scalpers in a series of 'corrupt schemes'" (NEWSDAY,
7/25). BLOOMBERG NEWS' Andrew Galvin writes that of the
eight team employees indicted, four of the Yankees ticket
agents were arrested at Yankee Stadium before Sunday's game.
An investigation began after a fan "complained that he had
bought Yankees tickets from a scalper who approached him
outside the stadium, then saw the same man working at the
Yankees' advance-ticket window after the game" (BLOOMBERG
NEWS, 7/25). Yesterday, Morgenthau thanked both teams "for
their cooperation in the probe" (N.Y. DAILY NEWS, 7/25).
Yankees COO Lonn Trost said that after the incident, the
team would "overhaul its system of ticket sales." Trost:
"We will be working internally, with professionals and with
Ticketmaster, to make sure that fans are adequately
protected" (N.Y. TIMES, 7/25).