Ippei Mizuhara, the former interpreter for Dodger star Shohei Ohtani, will make his first court appearance on Friday.
It comes just a day after he was charged with federal bank fraud for allegedly taking over $16 million from Ohtani’s bank account to cover his gambling debt.
If convicted, Mizuhara could spend up to 30 years in federal prison.
During a press conference Thursday, U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada said that not only did Mizuhara have access to Ohtani’s accounts, but also even helped Ohtani set up a bank account.
“Mr. Mizuhara had access to that bank account and he refused to give access to Mr. Ohtani’s other professional advisors, including his agent, his accountant, and his financial advisor, and he told them that Mr. Ohtani wanted to keep that account,” Estrada said.
Authorities also said Mizuhara impersonated Ohtani on the phone in order to get bank officials to approve and send out the big wire transfers.
In ESPN interview in March, Mizuhara said he’d asked Ohtani to pay off the debt and that the baseball star had done so.
He later recanted his statements, saying Ohtani didn’t know about the gambling debts.
Mizuhara was fired by the Dodgers.
Ohtani told reporters he had no idea Mizuhara stole money from his account. A report by TMZ Sports on Wednesday said federal investigators in the case had cleared Ohtani.
KNX News has reached out to MLB officials to see if the charges against Mizuhara will impact the organization’s own investigation.
City News Service contributed to this report.
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