After at least three weeks of negotiations with the US Department of Justice, the UK gambling group BetonSports has reached a settlement of its US online gambling issue. 

U.S. Attorney Catherine Hanaway agreed the settlement Thursday this week which permanently bars the London-based company from accepting any bets from the United States. The settlement ends a massive civil case Hanaway filed this summer. 

The settlement also requires BetOnSports to open a toll-free telephone service to inform bettors how they can reclaim wagers pending before the suit was filed. 

U.S. District Judge Carol Jackson signed an order in St. Louis enforcing the accord, ending four months of litigation and weeks of speculation after the company and the government first said they were close to settling. Her order was accompanied by a consent agreement signed by lawyers for Betonsports and the Justice Department.  

"The defendant has no legally recognizable right to operate in the United States,'' Jackson wrote in the order, posted on the court's Web site. It is illegal to bet on a sporting event using an interstate phone line, the judge noted. 

Betonsports took in $1.25 billion in wagers in 2004, 98 percent of which was sports bets placed by U.S. gamblers using Betonsports' Web sites and American phone lines, Jackson's order revealed.  

Betonsports didn't admit wrongdoing, the order said.  

Betonsports spokesman Kevin Smith declined to comment immediately on the court order.
 
The order didn't address the pending criminal racketeering case against the company and 11 men and women including founder Gary Kaplan; former Chief Executive Officer David Carruthers; Kaplan's brother Neil; and a sister, Lori Kaplan Multz.  

Carruthers was arrested in July as he changed planes at a Dallas airport. He has been under house arrest in St. Louis since pleading not guilty July 31. Neil Kaplan, Multz and five other defendants also pleaded not guilty.  

Gary Kaplan hasn't been apprehended.