MLB Suspends Prospect Who Faked His Own Death
From the "Just when you thought you'd heard it all" department, comes this: MLB has suspended a young international prospect out of the Dominican, foiling a $2.8 million fraud scheme. The player had faked his death and played amateur ball under a false identity and a false age.
MLB suspended Daury David Severino Damaso after uncovering an alleged plot to make him appear nearly two years younger, per @Alden_Gonzalez.
— Foul Territory (@FoulTerritoryTV) August 28, 2026
The scheme reportedly included falsified records, a fake identity, a fraudulent death certificate, and a planted tombstone. pic.twitter.com/AJBJuxJVOQ
According to the ESPN report from Alden Gonzalez:
"Major League Baseball has suspended a once-prized Dominican prospect after uncovering an elaborate age-fraud plot that included a fictitious death and gravesite tombstone, sources familiar with the investigation told ESPN.
MLB suspends Dominican prospect over fake identity, fake age & fake death certificate scandal
"The MLB investigation uncovered a series of extreme efforts by the player's handler to make him appear nearly two years younger than he actually is, including faking a birth certificate to create a new identity, falsifying medical and school records, filing a fraudulent death certificate, and even creating the gravesite scene, according to sources."
The Cleveland Guardians agreed with a young infielder going by the name of David Severino to a $2.8 million pre-deal. The Guardians were led to believe that he was 13 or 14 years old, thus the "pre-deal" that would be finalized in 2029, when "Severino" would be 17 and eligible to sign.
But Severino's real name is Daury David Severino Damaso and he is actually 16 years old. He'd been playing against youth players a couple of years younger than him, leading him to stand out for scouts.
Suspended prospect had fake tombstone created to fake his death as part of $2.8M plot to scam MLB
A fraudulent death certificate had also been filed for Daury as part of the whole scheme, listing his death from a respiratory illness on May 5, 2012, two years after he was born. A fake tombstone was even created and planted in a gravesite in La Romana, DR.
"You have to have [guts] to do something like this," John Pereyra, a trainer who worked with Severino, said in Spanish, per Gonzalez. "I've heard about false birth documents and stuff like that, but to put together what this guy did -- that's movie stuff. That's the first time I've ever seen anything like that in the Dominican. In my life, I have never seen anything like that."
Surprisingly, after learning all that, the MLB suspension of Daury Damaso is only for one year, meaning he'll only have to wait an extra year to enter the international amateur market, in 2028, at which point he'd become eligible to sign with a team.
However, a scout told Gonzalez that if he does sign, he'll probably only get $10,000. A far cry from the $2.8 million the Guardians were prepared to pay. They are now off the hook.