BALLING OUT OF CONTROL! DUDE LOSES $125 MILLION @ THE CASINOS!

A gambler who didn't know when to hold 'em -- or know when to fold 'em -- reportedly lost a jaw-dropping $125 million during a single year of gambling in Las Vegas.
Now Terrance Watanabe faces criminal charges for nonpayment of the debts incurred during his gambling binges, London's Daily Mail newspaper reports.

In a feat of excess depraved even by Vegas' standards, Watanabe reportedly bet $825 million at Caesars Palace and Rio casinos -- occasionally losing millions of dollars in a single 24-hour excursion and becoming a one-man freak show tourists would ogle.

"It got to the point where people would go just to watch," a Las Vegas regular told the Daily Mail. "There are a lot of things that make you cringe in Vegas -- but I've never seen anything like that."

His choices in games of chance were consistently boneheaded, the paper reports, as he would stay up all night to blow thousands on roulette and slot machines -- games in which odds are heavily in the house's favor.

Vegas associates reportedly say he brought his bad game to the blackjack table as well, where he'd regularly sit at a $50,000-limit table playing three hands simultaneously -- and badly.

"He made such bad decisions on the blackjack table,” one of Watanabe's personal handlers at Caesars Palace, Kristian Kunder, said of Watanabe.

His antics earned him a personal bartender at both Caesars and the Rio, the Daily Mail reports, and he earned notoriety handing out stacks of hundred-dollar bills -- sometimes up to $20,000 -- to casino personnel as tips.

The 52-year-old toy magnate-turned-philanthropist has fired back with a lawsuit against the two casinos, alleging he was regularly plied with drugs and alcohol before being turned loose to run rampant on the casino floor.

Allowing intoxicated people to gamble is a violation of gaming rules.

A former defense attorney for Watanabe vowed to produce a Caesars security guard who "does not recall ever seeing Mr. Watanabe in a sober state."

Watanabe was charged with the theft of more than $14.5 million in losses the casinos say he failed to repay.

He is free on a $1.5 million bail, the Daily Mail reports, and faces 16 years in jail if convicted. His trial is set for July.