That's not an equivalent example.
This would be. You used to shoot porn in China, the government found out you did. You left and moved back to the US (or somewhere that porn is legal to shoot). Then you went to China in '08 for the Olympics. You shouldn't be wondering why you're getting arrested.
I don't understand what part of this people are failing to understand. If you are doing business with US citizens with US credit cards and US bank accounts, then you are effectively transacting business in the US.
Just because you are from another country, or your company is located in another country, it does not give you the right to break the laws of ANY country where you do business.
If not collecting VAT were a criminal offense, a lot of US executives and business owners would be arrested in the EU when they visited.
For years Germany has been sending letters to people in our industry telling them to either stop selling porn in Germany or face issues if they are ever caught in Germany. Just because they've not enforced any of the letters yet, that doesn't mean they can't or won't.
I can also promise you that all of these people, ESPECIALLY the ones with sportsbooks, KNOW and UNDERSTAND that they can and probably stand a good chance of going to jail if they are caught in the US. I don't know a single gaming company that hasn't heard the Jay Cohen story, and if you read down a few paragraphs in the 2002 article he wrote, you'll figure out just who the "Largest sportsbook in England and Ireland" is in relation to this thread.
http://www.freejaycohen.com/RealStoryJayPg.html