Shortly after federal prosecutors charged Shohei Ohtani's former interpreter Thursday with unlawfully transferring millions of dollars from the account of the MLB star, news of the complaint circulated through a ballroom at a glitzy Tampa hotel.
When prosecutors from the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Central District of California, unsealed charges against Ippei Mizuhara'Thursday afternoon, a contingent of gambling attorneys sat through a luncheon address at the 2024 International Masters of Gambling Law Spring Conference in Tampa Bay. There is some irony that the luncheon tackled issues on problem and responsible gaming considering that Mizuhara incurred massive losses on sports betting in the last three years.
Mizuhara, 39, is accused of illegally transferring more than $16 million from Ohtani's bank account to pay off gambling debts incurred with a California illegal bookmaking operation. The charges immediately raised an eyebrow for key stakeholders at the conference considering that previous reports placed the figure at closer to $4.5 million.
“This is troubling, it's the shot heard around the world,” said Bill Pascrell III, partner at Princeton Public Affairs Group. “We have to get ahead of this, the industry needs to be more self-regulating and has to take issues like this far more seriously.”