NEW YORK (AP) — Former Cleveland Guardians pitchers Emmanuel Clase and Luis Ortiz go to trial Monday on charges that they accepted bribes as they colluded with gamblers who made hundreds of thousands of dollars betting correctly on individual pitches.
Their careers and possibly their freedom are at stake in the jury trial expected to unfold over the next month in Brooklyn federal court. Several professional baseball players, including catchers and baseball executives, are among witnesses expected to testify.
Clase, the Guardians’ former closer, and Ortiz, a starter, have pleaded not guilty to conspiracy charges and are on nondisciplinary leave from the club without pay while their fate is determined.
According to an indictment, the pitchers accepted several thousand dollars in payoffs to help two gamblers from their native Dominican Republic win at least $460,000 on in-game prop bets on the speed and outcome of certain pitches.
Prosecutors allege that Clase began providing the bettors with information about his pitches in 2023 and recruited Ortiz into the scheme in 2025. Lawyers for Ortiz unsuccessfully sought to have Ortiz tried separately from Clase.
Judge Kiyo A. Matsumoto said at a conference Friday that she hopes to complete jury selection quickly enough that lawyers can deliver relatively short opening statements in the afternoon.
Clase, 28, is a three-time All-Star and two-time American League Reliever of the Year who had completed his fourth season of a $20 million, five-year contract when charges against the pitchers were revealed in November 2025.
Ortiz, 27, had earned $782,600 as a starting pitcher for the Guardians during the 2025 season.
The pitchers have been charged with wire fraud conspiracy, honest services wire fraud conspiracy, money laundering conspiracy and conspiracy to influence sporting contests by bribery.
Defense lawyers are expected to argue that the pitchers did not collude with gamblers and instead were varying the placement of pitches strategically to fool batters.
On Friday, the judge ruled that prosecutors cannot show the jury proof that Clase owed $500,000 in U.S. taxes because they had only provided the evidence to defense lawyers several days earlier and long after a deadline had passed to turn over evidence to their adversaries.
A prosecutor had argued that the government wanted to put the evidence in the trial to offset any claim by Clase's lawyers that he had no incentive to collude with gamblers because he had several million dollars in financial accounts in the Dominican Republic.
Major League Baseball and the Guardians have both said they've fully cooperated with authorities. MLB has said it contacted federal law enforcement when it began investigating unusual betting activity.
FILE - Cleveland Guardians' Luis Ortiz leaves Brooklyn federal court, on Feb. 18, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura, File)
FILE - Cleveland Guardians' Emmanuel Clase leaves Brooklyn federal court, on Feb. 18, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura, File)
VIENNA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov 2, 2026--
Speech Processing Solutions (SPS), the global leader in professional dictation and transcription solutions sold under the Philips brand, today announced the launch of Philips SpeechLive Legal Direct and Philips SpeechLive Professional Direct. The two solutions allow legal and other professionals to dictate into supported desktop applications, with recognized text appearing as they speak. They are designed both for organizations adopting professional speech recognition for the first time and for customers moving from established or end-of-life speech recognition solutions.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20261029365830/en/
Philips SpeechLive Legal Direct – legal speech recognition, directly at cursor
With support of 29 voice commands across 19 languages, these new solutions combine familiar dictation practices with commands covering navigation, selection, editing, formatting, lists and help functions. Professionals can continue working on their documents by voice, without repeatedly switching to keyboard and mouse, while remaining within the connected Philips SpeechLive environment. Automatic and spoken punctuation provide flexibility in how dictated text is structured. For conversations involving more than one participant, real-time multi-speaker recognition can distinguish different voices and organize recognized speech using speaker identifiers and timestamps. This provides a structured starting point for reviewing client discussions, interviews and meetings.
“SPS transforms professional speech into results,” said Dr. Thomas Brauner, CEO of Speech Processing Solutions. “With SpeechLive Legal Direct and SpeechLive Professional Direct, our portfolio now combines speech recognition at cursor with dictation workflows and optional AI-assisted document creation, offering organizations a clear path to modernize their documentation while retaining the working practices they value.”
Specialist speech recognition for legal professionals
SpeechLive Legal Direct uses Speech Recognition Legal, which is tuned for specialist legal language – including terminology, citations, references and frequently used expressions – to help reduce repetitive correction. Vocabulary and Replacements allow for the configuration of regularly used legal terms and preferred written forms.
Professional speech recognition that reflects an organization’s language
SpeechLive Professional Direct brings the same real-time, at-the-cursor experience to professionals working across a broad range of industries. Configurable Vocabulary helps recognition adapt to industry terminology, company names, technical expressions and frequently used phrases, while Replacements allow preferred written forms and recurring expressions to be standardized.
Built around professional dictation hardware and workflows
Both solutions are delivered through the redesigned SpeechLive desktop application, built to support the full Direct experience. They integrate with compatible Philips SpeechMike Premium and Philips SpeechMike Ambient devices, with configurable hardware controls for frequently used dictation functions. Depending on the connected device, supported button functions include microphone control and selected correction functions. Real-time dictation at the cursor is available through the desktop application, while SpeechLive web supports pre-recorded audio uploads and established SpeechLive workflows.
Legal Direct and Professional Direct complement the Philips SpeechLive AI Assistants, which provide a separate workflow for AI-assisted document creation. The Direct solutions focus on real-time speech recognition and voice-driven document control as a separate offering to AI-assisted drafting. Organizations can choose between speech recognition at cursor, established dictation and transcription workflows, or AI-assisted document drafting according to the requirements of each use case.
Designed for continuity, security and professional control
For organizations transitioning from established professional speech recognition tools, Legal Direct and Professional Direct are designed to retain familiar dictation behaviors while moving users into the broader SpeechLive environment.
Confidentiality and data protection are central considerations when adopting new documentation technology, particularly for legal organizations. Both solutions operate within the established SpeechLive security and data-protection framework, including Microsoft Azure infrastructure, service-region data residency, access controls and recognized organizational certifications (ISO 27001, ISO 9001 and ISO 14001). Data processing is subject to applicable privacy and data protection requirements, including GDPR. Recognized text remains under professional control and can be reviewed, corrected, and finalized by the user before being used in legal or business documentation.
Availability
Philips SpeechLive Legal Direct and Philips SpeechLive Professional Direct are available now, in markets where SpeechLive is commercially offered, subject to supported recognition languages, product availability and technical requirements. Supported recognition languages include English (UK), English (US), French, German, Austrian German and Swiss German, with availability dependent on region, configuration and product release.
About Speech Processing Solutions
Speech Processing Solutions is a global leader in voice-driven documentation, with more than 70 years of innovation in professional speech technology. Under the Philips brand, SPS provides professional dictation hardware, SpeechLive software, specialized speech recognition and AI-assisted documentation solutions used by more than four million users across 50+ countries.
Philips SpeechLive Legal Direct – legal speech recognition, directly at cursor
