From College World Series Hero to $32M Ponzi Scheme

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He was a College World Series champion, a pro baseball prospect and a relative of Tampa mob boss Santo Trafficante Jr. Then a gambling addiction drove Sam Favata to run a $32 million Ponzi scheme that sent him to federal prison.

In 1979, Sam hit .418 for Cal State Fullerton, a national college record that stood for 16 years, and scored the winning run in the school's first College World Series title. The Milwaukee Brewers drafted him. Two years later, in Modesto, an 87 mph fastball hit him in the head. He needed surgery for three brain bleeds, and doctors weren't sure he'd survive, let alone walk or talk again. Nine months later he was back on the same field, and almost 5,000 fans gave him a three-minute standing ovation after his first hit.

But Sam was already hiding something. He placed his first bet at 19, at a Las Vegas craps table on a road trip with his Fullerton teammates, and lost everything his father had given him for the weekend. On the drive home, he realized he was more upset about losing at the casino than losing at baseball. He kept that secret for 26 years.

Gambling ran in the family. Sam was born in Tampa, and his second cousin was Santo Trafficante Jr., the mob boss who ran Florida and pre-Castro Cuba for the American Mafia. Trafficante was later tied to the CIA's plots to kill Fidel Castro and long rumored to be connected to the JFK assassination, which he denied under oath. Sam's father ran bolita numbers for the organization before he walked away and moved the family to California to give his son a different life. Sam talks about growing up close to that world, and about the secret Trafficante is said to have revealed about Kennedy on his deathbed.

After baseball, Sam built a career in mortgages and started a family with his wife, Sandra. He talks about losing their baby son, Joey, and the grief that followed. Through all of it, his gambling kept growing: VIP status at Caesars, a $1 million credit line at the Rio, a $985,000 win on a March Madness parlay. Then, in 2005, he bet $1.425 million on a single regular-season NHL game and lost.

To keep chasing his losses, Sam turned his Orange County company, National Consumer Mortgage, into a Ponzi scheme. He persuaded more than 200 people to refinance their homes and invest with him, promising returns of 30 to 60 percent. There was no investment. According to the SEC, he used more than $10 million of their money