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Legally Dead Commodities Broker Found Working As Vegas Bookie

LAS VEGAS (CBS) -- A onetime commodities broker from Chicago has been missing since the Carter administration, and was declared legally dead a quarter century ago.

But it turns out that Arthur Gerald Jones has been with us all along, and had been working as a bookie in Las Vegas. Jones, 72, is in big trouble now.

LISTEN: Newsradio 780's Mike Krauser reports

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The Chicago Tribune reported that Jones, who had a seat on the Chicago Board of Trade, was reported missing in 1979. He had been living in Highland Park with his wife and three children.

His disappearance was immediately labeled suspicious, and police believed he might have run into trouble with gambling debts and possible mob affiliations, the Tribune reported.

Jones was declared legally dead in 1986, and his family collected his Social Security benefits.

But investigators say it turned out that Jones was very much alive all along, and actually has been living under the alias of Joseph Richard Sandelli since about the time of his disappearance.

"Mr. Jones apparently had a valid Social Security number that was issued to another person, and that's how he was discovered, was someone filed a complaint," said Kevin Malone of the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles.

Malone said Jones first went to Florida under the Sandelli alias, and then to Las Vegas in the late 1980s.

For the past ten years, he's been working there in a sports betting operation.

Jones is set to appear in court on charges of felony identity theft and fraud on Aug. 23. His attorney, Stephen Stein, didn't immediately return a call from The Associated Press Friday.

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