Federal prosecutors are seeking a lighter sentence for the bookie who accepted bets from Shohei Ohtani's interpreter Ippei Mizuhara, according to a federal motion acquired by the Nevada Current.
Key Takeaways
- Ippei Mizuhara’s bookie helped federal prosecutors in several cases
- Matthew Bowyer claimed he’s “not a rat” in a recent interview
- The California bookmaker had over 700 clients and was making $2,000 a day
Matthew Bowyer, who pleaded guilty to running an illegal gambling business in California as well as money laundering and tax fraud charges, had a proposed 41 to 51 months of prison time. However, due to his cooperation with the federal investigation into Mizuhara and Resorts World in Las Vegas, where Bowyer laundered and gambled away millions he made as a bookmaker, prosecutors are now requesting a lower, “reasonable” sentence.
“A low-end custodial sentence of 15 months is appropriate here, balancing the seriousness and multi-faceted nature of his conduct and need for specific and general deterrence, with defendant’s personal and mitigating circumstances, and having already accounted for his acceptance of responsibility, lack of criminal history, and assistance to the government,” federal prosecutors wrote in the motion.
His lack of a criminal history and helping investigators bring charges against another California bookmaker played a role in the leniency request. The feds’ motion was filed on Aug. 15, and a California judge is expected to sentence Bowyer next week.
Helpful hand
Bowyer’s assistance helped prosecutors with the case against Mizuhara, who stole nearly $17 million from the Los Angeles Dodgers star’s bank account to pay off gambling debts. Mizuhara made over 19,000 bets with Bowyer and paid the bookie hundreds of millions of dollars that Mizuhara was taking from Ohtani without the baseball player’s knowledge.
Mizuhara pleaded guilty to bank and tax fraud charges and was sentenced to 57 months in prison in February.
Bowyer “provided information in a voluntary interview” on Damien LeForbes, a professional poker player charged with illegal bookmaking.
“It makes me look like I’m a rat,” Bowyer told the Nevada Current this week. “Damian and I had a relationship and a friendship, and I was gambling through his operation. All of that evidence, including conversations about (former MGM executive) Scott Sibella, were on my telephone. I verified what was on my phone.”
Bowyer interpreted recovered text messages that led to a search warrant on LeForbes in December 2023. LeForbes pleaded guilty to charges of money laundering and running an illegal business in October 2024. He’s still awaiting sentencing.
Extensive business
According to the motion, Bowyer ran his “extensive” illegal bookmaking business for at least five years and took bets from over 700 bettors, making over $2,000 a day.
“These crimes stemmed from defendant’s years-long operation of a large-scale gambling business that took hundreds of millions of dollars in bets from hundreds of bettors on sporting events, made thousands of dollars daily, and used multiple accounts in his name and others’ to receive and move that money around,” prosecutors said.
To help clean the illegal bookmaking funds, Bowyer, along with Forbes and another individual, laundered $24 million through Resorts World, which was hit with a $10.5 million fine by Nevada regulators for its role in the illegal act. The Las Vegas casino and hotel is still working on an agreement with federal prosecutors.
Bowyer said in that Nevada Current interview that he gave up casino executives and hosts, but did not name anyone else aside from Mizuhara and LeForbes.
