2 Men Arrested on Suspicion of Impersonating Ohtani to Defraud Senior; Nepali Father, Son Allegedly Stole ¥1 Million from Woman

The Yomiuri Shimbun

15:41 JST, June 25, 2025

A Nepali father and son have been arrested for allegedly impersonating Los Angeles Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani to swindle cash from an elderly woman.

According to the Takanawa Police Station of the Metropolitan Police Department, 26-year-old university student Niure Suman Kumar and his father Sharma Padma Nath, 44, were arrested on Tuesday. The two men are Nepali nationals living in Adachi Ward, Tokyo.

They have admitted to the allegations, the police said.

The father and son allegedly conspired with accomplices last November. Using social media to impersonate Ohtani, they are suspected of telling a woman in her 80s in Minato Ward, Tokyo, that “because I’m the world’s best baseball player, I need several tens of millions of yen for insurance premiums.” They allegedly defrauded her of ¥1 million.

The woman sent a message of support to a Facebook account purported to belong to Ohtani, after which she was lured to the LINE message app and subsequently asked for money, the police said.

The arrested university student is believed to have acted as a “receiver” for a fraud group, receiving the cash while posing as Ohtani’s agent, and then transferring the money to his father’s bank account.