The series of $500,000 payments Ippei Mizuhara sent from Shohei Ohtani\'s bank account to an illegal bookmaking operation were forwarded to casinos in California and Las Vegas, where the money was deposited in gambling accounts, converted to playing chips and cashed out to pay the bookie, according to multiple sources.
Mathew Bowyer, the California bookmaker who took Mizuhara\'s bets, was a frequent customer at Las Vegas casino Resorts World.
Mizuhara paid his losses to Bowyer\'s associate, who forwarded the money to his own \"marker\" accounts at Resorts World and Pechanga Resort Casino in Southern California. The men then withdrew chips from the marker account, gambled with them, and if they won, cashed out, according to sources.
Bowyer, 49, lost $7.9 million at Resorts World from June 2022 to October 2023, according to multiple sources. After Bowyer\'s home was raided by federal agents on Oct. 5, he was dubbed a known bookmaker and banned from entering casinos throughout the United States.