Here is a surreal but increasingly common sight to behold: Christian Dawkins conducting business on college campuses. And not just any business, but that of guiding high-profile basketball recruits on their collegiate decisions, with financial considerations in mind.

Not long ago, Dawkins was designated by the federal government as the prime corrupter of NCAA Division I men’s basketball, made to serve 18 months in prison for his role at the center of an FBI investigation into pay-to-play deals made with top college prospects and agent bribes to college assistant coaches.

He was arrested in September 2017, along with nine other individuals, including four college assistants and two Adidas representatives. In a press conference announcing the indictments, the acting U.S. Attorney in Manhattan argued that in giving money to college athletes, Dawkins and his co-conspirators had defrauded schools by compromising the players’ NCAA eligibility.

One of the schemes of primary focus involved Adidas money that was allegedly paid to the father of a high school basketball recruit, Brian Bowen II, to ensure his commitment to Louisville. In the fallout of the indictments, the Cardinals fired their legendary head coach Rick Pitino and received a two-year NCAA probation.

Fast forward to late last month, when Dawkins says he accompanied Louisville’s prized recruiting target, Mikel Brown Jr., considered one of the top-10 high school basketball prospects in the class of 2025, on a campus visit.

What to make of this?

“It shows what happened in 2017 was all a crock of s—t, basically,” said Dawkins.

Brown is among the spangled coterie of prep and college basketball clients represented by Seros Partners, a sports and entertainment agency founded earlier this year by Dawkins, former NBA player Trevor Booker and Booker’s college teammate-turned-business partner Jonah Baize. For the last dozen years, Booker and Baize have operated Combine Academy, an international boarding school and “professional sports performance center” in suburban Charlotte, N.C., which has produced hundreds of Division I athletes in basketball, baseball, soccer and golf.

Dawkins serves as partner/CEO of Seros, which rose from the ashes of his previous failed venture, Par-Lay Sports and Entertainment. Booker and Baize, who have kept the reins of Combine Academy while launching Seros, say that they had long sought to make a vertical integration play into athlete representation, and declined multiple offers to partner with individuals far less controversial than Dawkins. As part of the creation of Seros, Dawkins now has a multimillion-dollar stake—at least on paper—in Booker’s and Baize’s investment firm, JB Fitzgerald Venture Capital.

“Trust me, we did not do a deal with our eyes closed,” Baize said. “The fact Christian got a nod from us says where he is at, as both a person and business person. We have turned down a lot of other people.”

Added Booker: “It makes it extremely hard if you are a felon. People look at you a certain way. Most of the time they don’t look at your story. They just see you got accused of something or charged with something. I am kind of glad it happened that way, that people did look at him [like that], because it ended up helping me.”

While it aspires to one day compete for the top NBA stars with mega-agencies like Klutch Sports Group, Seros is mostly focused on building its stable of young players farther down the ladder, who can now retain agents and do endorsement deals while in college. Even if certain Seros athletes end up jumping to competitors by the time they bank their big NBA contracts—an experience all too familiar for Dawkins—there is plenty of money to be made before then.

Dawkins estimates Seros’ roster of current college freshmen—which includes Louisville forward Khani Rooths— will collectively make more than $5 million in NIL deals this year, while its class of 2025 clients—Brown, Jr.; ESPN.com’s No. 22 recruit Davion Hannah; Combine Academy’s Kaden Magwood (No. 57 on ESPN.com); South Carolina commit Eli Ellis; and Ole Miss commit Tylis Jordan, among others—will earn more than $10 million altogether. According to Dawkins, Seros typically takes a commission of between 10% and 20% on college NIL deals it handles.

As of last week, Dawkins, who lives in Atlanta, has completed the post-incarceration probation that was part of his sentencing, officially bringing to a close the legal saga that began seven years ago when he was arrested at the W Hotel in Times Square by machine-gun-toting FBI agents. Four months earlier, Dawkins, then 24, had been introduced to a purported real estate tycoon named Jeff D’Angelo, who offered to invest in Lloyd Management Inc., a new athlete representation business Dawkins was trying to start at the time.

In fact, D’Angelo was the pseudonym of an undercover FBI agent who had already spent years leading an operation codenamed “Ballerz.” As Dawkins has previously recounted, upon being taken into custody, he declined the FBI’s offer to wear a wire and become an informant in the feds’ pursuit of bigger fish like Pitino.

Now out from behind bars, and no longer forced to work in the shadows of college basketball’s recruiting industry, Dawkins brims with gratitude and optimism. In the course of three telephone interviews with Sportico, he even expressed contrition for the “crock of s—t” legal situation that many have come to find him as the victim of.

“Here’s the No. 1 f—ing bottom line to this story: Don’t go to prison,” he said.

Dawkins says his current day-to-day work as Seros’ scout-in-chief is not all that much different from what he did in his pre-jail, pre-NIL work, aside from the scale of the money involved. He notes that the total amount of cash at the center of the college basketball prosecutions is less than many of his clients will each earn in permissible NIL money this year.

Yet, even with the system liberalized to its current state, Dawkins still is forced to play by the rules—and double-standards—of others, namely his young star-athlete clients, their families and the disparate “advisors”  who continue to hold sway in an industry that, until only recently, operated as a completely underground economy.

“These clients will hire and fire you at the drop of a hat,” said Steve Haney, the attorney who represented Dawkins in his criminal cases. “They will borrow money and not repay it. And unfortunately, the parents and families are just as responsible and guilty.”

In mid-2020, while Dawkins was appealing his criminal convictions, Haney joined his client in forming Par-Lay, which experienced a quick boom followed by a spectacular bust. In time, Haney says his role became that of Dawkins’ proxy on the outside, trying to help keep the business going so that his client would have a ready revenue source upon release. A certified NBA player agent, who once represented the likes of Magic Johnson and Dominique Wilkins, Haney came away chastened by this latest experience.

“The nature of the business is so corrupt, it is so difficult to find not just good business partners but good clients, to be quite frank,” Haney said. “I have cartel clients who I would trust more than these basketball players and parents.”

When told of Haney’s quote, Dawkins winced.

“I don’t get that same vibe,” he said. “I think if my intent was different, I would maybe feel a little bit more salty. But the plan that we’ve had is now working at a pretty high level. … I hate to be so positive, but I don’t really have anything negative to say about anybody or anything at this moment.”

During his criminal prosecution, Dawkins argued that the government had lost the plot in determining who the real victims were in the NCAA’s system. Indeed, the schools, which prosecutors said were being ripped off by criminals, were also benefiting from the underground economy. Dawkins’ defense only proved so persuasive before a jury.

In October 2018, he was convicted of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud related to the payments made to Bowen. Dawkins was sentenced to six months behind bars, two years of supervised release, and ordered to make restitution payments of $28,261. In May 2019, Dawkins was convicted on two of six counts in a second trial that focused on bribes, dating back at least four years, that Dawkins made to college assistant coaches so they would steer their players to ASM Sports. For that, he was sentenced to an additional 12 months in prison.

Throughout the trials, and in the aftermath of his sentencing, Dawkins maintained that he had wronged no one, a position that found increasing support among the public. His prosecution coincided with a national swing in sentiment against the NCAA’s amateurism rules and the passing of a series of state-based laws that sought to override the association’s prohibition on college athletes doing endorsement deals. In December 2019, five months after Dawkins’ second conviction, California enacted the nation’s first law establishing the rights of college athletes to profit from their name, image and likeness. After a dozen other states followed suit, the NCAA ultimately suspended its athlete NIL restrictions by July 2021. Earlier this year, the NCAA’s Division I council adopted new bylaws that allow its member institutions to directly help source and facilitate athlete NIL deals.

Though prosecutors had portrayed the September 2017 indictments as only the start of the takedown—“we have your playbook,” the assistant director of the FBI’s New York office memorably said at the time—no other individuals have been charged. Of the 10 who were, most of whom pleaded guilty to lesser charges, Dawkins faced the harshest punishment: a year-and-a-half imprisonment carried out at minimum security facilities in Alabama, Atlanta and North Carolina.

While out on appeal, Dawkins took his case to the court of public opinion, serving as the first-person narrator in the HBO documentary, The Scheme. The film, which was originally released in March 2020, recounted Dawkins’ rise in the grassroots world and the challenges he faced along the way. He grew up the son of a prominent high school and AAU basketball coach in Michigan, and his younger brother, Dorian, was considered among the country’s top eighth-grade basketball players before collapsing and dying on the practice court from an undiagnosed heart condition. Christian Dawkins had determined that, unlike his brother, he was not cut out to be an elite athlete, and instead trained his attention on coaching.

After taking over his father’s AAU team, which he rechristened as Dorian’s Pride, he quickly established himself as the levee operator of a rich midwestern river of hoops talent. In 2014, he was hired by the Cleveland-based International Management Advisors to serve as executive director of sports and entertainment, where he was tasked with trying to develop relationships with future NBA players in the hopes of getting them to sign with IMA by the time they turned pro. The following year, he left to join ASM Sports, led by power agent Andy Miller, and helped recruit to the firm 10 NBA first-round picks over two years. But legal troubles arose.

In May 2016, IMA sued ASM Sports and Miller, alleging that Dawkins had been steering clients to his future employer while still under contract at IMA. Specifically, IMA identified Dawkins’ relationship with Jarell Martin, a McDonald’s High School All-American forward who went on to win All-SEC freshman honors at LSU. Martin ended up signing with ASM Sports in March 2015 and was later picked in the late first round of the 2015 NBA Draft.

Dawkins, though not named as a defendant, was also accused of “fraudulently” using an IMA credit card issued to its client, Elfrid Payton, to run up over $42,722 in Uber expenses for ASM. In The Scheme, Dawkins insisted that this was an inadvertent mix-up. The parties eventually settled the lawsuit, and ASM formally dissociated itself from Dawkins by May 2017.

In conjunction with Dawkins’ arrest that September, the FBI raided ASM’s headquarters in Englewood, N.J., and Miller, though never charged, was forced to relinquish his certification to represent NBA players. Brian Jungreis, who had been serving in a non-agent role as ASM’s director of basketball operations, took over duties representing several of the players Dawkins had brought to the agency, including Martin and Fred VanVleet.

“We were losing guys pretty regularly at that point,” Jungreis said. He recalled being in China to visit Martin, who was playing for the Shenzhen Aviators, when he was awakened at 3 a.m. by a phone call from another ASM client informing him that he, too, would be defecting. 

In the grand tradition of 21st century commerce, Jungreis pivoted. Upon returning stateside, Jungreis said VanVleet suggested that he start a new agency with Derek Folk, VanVleet’s Los Angeles-based financial advisor, and Dawkins, who had introduced Folk to VanVleet.

Jungreis says he was the one who came up with the name Par-Lay, a riff off the idea of making a “bet on yourself,” VanVleet’s personal mantra.

The agency was launched in mid-2020, just as Dawkins was taking up the fight to overturn his convictions. In addition to himself, Jungries and Folk, the venture was joined by Haney. Par-Lay’s core of talent included VanVleet, Martin, Richaun Holmes and Malik Beasley, who Dawkins had previously recruited to sign with ASM out of college and who had recently fired Klutch. In September 2020, Beasley was arrested on charges of threatening a family member with a gun. Haney represented him in the case, which ended with Beasley agreeing to a plea deal that included a 120-day jail sentence.

Despite its relatively small client roster, Dawkins’ precarious legal situation and the dawning of the COVID pandemic, Par-Lay staffed up right away, even bringing on as a consultant Gerald Madkins, who had most recently served as the New York Knicks’ assistant general manager.

Without any upfront cash from outside financing, the firm was reliant on generated commissions to cover its swelling operational costs. By that fall, some money started to roll in, as Par-Lay negotiated VanVleet’s four-year, $85 million contract with the Toronto Raptors and Beasley’s four-year, $60 million contract with the Minnesota Timberwolves. Jungreis, who had only gotten certified by the NBA Players Association a year earlier, served as the agent of record on both deals. The following summer, Holmes signed a four-year, $55 million contract with the Sacramento Kings.

In addition to its group of league veterans, Dawkins worked his Atlanta connections to land Par-Lay a potential future NBA star, Scoot Henderson. The point guard out of Marietta, Ga., was a consensus top-five player in the class of 2025. After opting not to attend college, the 17-year-old Henderson signed a two-year contract with the NBA G League Ignite in May 2021, which paid him $500,000 per season. The following month, Sports Business Journal reported that Par-Lay had struck an alliance with Atlanta-based agent Wallace Prather, landing Par-Lay another G League Ignite teen sensation, Isaiah Todd.

“There were substantial fees generated and substantial operating revenue,” said Haney, who ended up representing Todd along with Prather. “But you are at the mercy of the players.”

After a judge denied his request for a new trial, Dawkins’ sentence began in March 2022. Even with its leader behind bars, it seemed, at least initially, that Par-Lay could still take care of its business. In June, the agency helped Henderson sign a five-year shoe deal with Puma that paid seven-figures annually. Haney said that he took the lead on the negotiations, but that Dawkins helped guide the process via email from prison.

“If he accomplished something that big behind bars, imagine what he could do when he’s free,” Haney said.

But as Dawkins’ incarceration wore on, things began to fall apart.

“We tried to grow too quickly,” observed Jungries.

Haney, however, primarily blames Par-Lay’s downfall on its clients, who he said were unwilling to stand by Dawkins after he had invested so much time and money in their careers. Barely a month after signing with the Kings, Holmes left Par-Lay for Creative Artists Agency. Todd ended up firing Par-Lay not long after signing his rookie contract with the Washington Wizards, then later went to Priority Sports and Entertainment.

Even VanVleet, who helped conceive of the agency, would only hold on for so long as its client. He left early last year to join Klutch, just ahead of signing a new three-year, $130 million contract with the Houston Rockets. And despite Par-Lay’s successful handling of his sneaker deal, Henderson decided to leave Par-Lay just before Dawkins was released from prison and go sans agent in the 2023 NBA Draft, where he was selected No. 3 by the Portland Trailblazers and signed a four-year, $44.4 million contract. 

“At a time, we were a top-10 agency that negotiated $300 million in contracts and then, in a year, it blew up in large part because of inherent disloyalty,” Haney said. “I certainly wasn’t tolerant, and I will take some responsibility. I am not willing to do what Christian does to maintain these relationships with these players. I went to law school to be a trial lawyer, and me getting in the weeds of this cesspool of sports management was not something I wanted to make a priority.”

Dawkins said there came to be an internal debate over whether to sell the agency while he was in prison, a move he strongly opposed. While Haney said he left with no animus towards Dawkins, the same was not true of Folk. “They really butted heads,”  Haney said.

Reached by cell phone, Folk declined to comment, saying, “I am not interested in talking about Christian.”

Someone who is interested in talking about Dawkins is Booker, the former Clemson star who made $35 million in NBA career earnings from 2010-2017.

In 2012, Booker and Baize launched Combine Academy as the cornerstone of The JB Fitzgerald Group, which now claims real estate holdings around the country as well as investments in the D.C. United, Overtime Sports and several other basketball-related concerns. According to Baize, the privately held company has a portfolio of assets worth more than $100 million.

During his pro career, Booker was an ASM client, but didn’t have much interaction with Dawkins. Booker, however, did work closely with Jungries, who recommended Booker connect with both VanVleet and Dawkins while seeking to expand Combine. VanVleet ended up touring the sports academy’s campus, and Booker had multiple discussions with Dawkins about acquiring Par-Lay in late 2020.

“Trevor and I always knew that instead of allowing other agents to recruit our players … why not us, in-house, offer this representation for their careers?” Baize said.

Though the initial merger talks didn’t pan out, Booker again sought out Dawkins after his release from prison last spring. Par-Lay was, by that point, a shell of itself, but still held the representation rights to Beasley—who was coming up for a contract renewal—and Henderson’s Puma deal. Moreover, through Henderson’s former club coach, Desmond Eastmond, Dawkins had connected to Mikel Brown Jr., who played last season for Overtime Elite.

Seros publicized its launch on May 1, shortly after Booker became licensed by the NBA Players Association. Baize, Booker and Dawkins are all partners, along with Mike Panaggio, the owner of DME Academy in Daytona Beach, Fla., where Brown is now attending his senior year of high school.

Jungreis joined as an agent, and currently represents about 20 to 25 overseas pros, including Jarell Martin, who most recently signed with a team in Australia.

For perhaps the first time in the long, jagged road of his still-young professional career, Dawkins seems to have found a source of solid footing.

“Myself and Jonah brought a sense of security for Christian,” Booker said. “So now, we can look at NIL deals, and get to do NIL deals, and it is not all about [future] loyalty. We don’t have to bank on loyalty.”

Sure enough, over the summer, Beasley decided to ditch Dawkins for Hazan Sports Management, just prior to signing a one-year, $6 million deal with the Detroit Pistons.

Then in August, Henderson decided at long last to hire an agency to handle his basketball negotiations: Klutch, where Andy Miller now serves as executive president.

In the face of all this fickleness, Dawkins maintains a stoic’s view.

“I don’t begrudge anybody, because it’s business,” he said. “There’s no permanent enemies in business, and there are no permanent friends.”

(This story has been corrected to note that Desmond Eastmond was the coach who connected Dawkins with Mikel Brown Jr.)