Ippei Mizuhara has agreed to plead guilty to federal charges of felony bank fraud and tax fraud.
Mizuhara was the longtime interpreter of Major League Baseball standout Shohei Ohtani. Ohtani, who was born in Japan, was known as a two-way player (a hitter and a pitcher) and was signed to a 10-year, $700 million deal with the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2023—considered one of the largest contracts in sports history. Before that, Ohtani made his American debut with the Los Angeles Angels in 2018, which is how he came to be associated with Mizuhara.
Mizuhara was hired to be a Japanese-language interpreter for Ohtani around the same time as the Angels signing. They had initially met in Japan in 2013. When Ohtani moved to the U.S., Mizuhara offered to be his interpreter. His duties also included driving and, prosecutors say, being “a de facto manager and gatekeeper.”
Allegations
According to court documents, on March 8, 2018, Mizuhara accompanied Ohtani to a bank in Phoenix, Arizona, to help him open a bank account to deposit his payroll salary. Importantly, Mizuhara also interpreted for Ohtani when the bank employee provided the login information for the account on the bank’s website.
Beginning in or about September 2021, Mizuhara started placing sports bets with an illegal bookmaker. He also began to lose. According to the complaint, he owed his bookmaker over one million dollars in losses. Remarkably, the bookmaker continued to increase his betting limits. On November 14, 2022, prosecutors say that Mizuhara texted his bookmaker, “I’m terrible at this sport betting thing huh? Lol . . . Any chance u can bump me again?? As you know, you don’t have to worry about me not paying!!”
Mizuhara continued to place bets, and his bookmaker continued to give him bumps—increases in limits—despite the losses. On or about June 24, 2023, Mizuhara messaged his bookmaker, “I have a problem lol. . . . Can I get one last last last bump? This one is for real. . . . Last one for real[.]”
He often said it was the last time. Only it wasn’t.
(Notably, records do not reflect any bets on baseball games.)
Since he couldn’t pay his debts, Mizuhara took money from Ohtani’s bank account. He also changed the registered email address and phone number online so that bank employees would call him and not Ohtani when attempting to verify wire transfers. To make the scheme work, he also contacted the bank pretending to be Ohtani on approximately 24 occasions. That allowed him to wire millions of dollars to the bookmaker.
He didn’t just use the money for gambling. When he needed dental work—$60,000 worth—Ohtani agreed to pay for it and authorized a check. Mizuhara took the check and deposited it into his account, but he used Ohtani’s debit card to pay for the dental work, pocketing the extra.
According to the plea agreement, Mizuhara bought approximately $325,000 worth of baseball cards online using sites like Etsy. The cards were paid for using Ohtani’s account and included Yogi Berra, Juan Soto, and, ironically, Ohtani. The complaint notes that when investigators took control of Mizuhara’s briefcase and boxes, they found approximately 1,000 baseball cards (it isn’t clear from the plea agreement whether all of the cards found were purchased using Ohtani’s money, but they did confirm $325,000 in purchases).
In total, Mizuhara pleaded to fraudulently obtaining more than $16,975,010 from Ohtani’s account.
At tax time, he told a different story. He reported to the IRS that, in 2022, his total taxable income was $136,865. By law, you have to report illegally gotten gains—and he didn’t report $4,100,000 that he stole that year. He also claimed that he was single when he was married. As a result of the false information on the return, Mizuhara owes additional taxes of approximately $1,149,400 for tax year 2022 (before interest and penalties).
Plea Agreement
The complaint against Mizuhara was filed on April 11, 2024. The plea shortens what would likely have been a lengthy—and distracting trial—involving Ohtani. Mizuhara could have been sentenced to 33 years in jail, but under the plea agreement, prosecutors will recommend a reduced sentence. The plea agreement also requires Mizuhara to pay full restitution to Ohtani.
Mizuhara is represented by Michael G. Freedman of Los Angeles, California. A request for comment made earlier this morning was not immediately returned.
Related Cases
Mizuhara also notified the court through his lawyers that his matter may be related to six additional cases previously assigned to Judge Dolly M. Gee. Those cases arise out of the same investigation of “illegal sports bookmaking organizations operating in Southern California.”
IRS-Criminal Investigation (CI) was involved in the Mizuhara case. Chris Seymour, a Special Agent of CI since February 2001, provided the affidavit in the original complaint. According to the complaint, IRS-CI, as well as agents of the Department of Homeland Security—Homeland Security Investigations—have been investigating illegal sports bookmaking organizations operating in Southern California and the laundering of the proceeds of these operations through casinos in Las Vegas, Nevada.
As part of CI’s investigation, Seymour also interviewed Ohtani and examined related evidence since Mizuhara initially suggested that Ohtani either knew about the debts or was somehow involved. As detailed in the complaint, CI concluded that Ohtani was not involved.
Pointedly, in a March 20, 2024, text, Mizuhara knew this was all about to blow up and texted the bookmaker, “Have you seen the reports?” The bookmaker responded, “Yes, but that’s all bullshit. Obviously you didn’t steal from him. I understand it’s a cover job I totally get it.” Mizuhara replied, “Technically I did steal from him. it’s all over for me.”
The case is USA v. Ippei Mizuhara, U. S. District Court for the Central District of California.
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