Ozaki was born in Racine, Wisconsin to a Japanese father (Jingaro Ozaki) and an American mother (Augusta Rathbun). He lost a leg as a young child.

In the mid fifties, Ozaki wrote around two dozen detective novels under his own name and the pseudonym Robert O. Saber.

In addition to his work as a writer, he was a journalist, artist, tax attorney and beauty parlor operator.

In the 1970s, he operated phony mail-order colleges, including the Colorado State Christian College and Hamilton State University, and he was also involved in a company marketing a device fraudulently claimed to increase gas mileage.

Ozaki also designed a dice game, Murder Dice, which was similar to Yahtzee and was based on the events in a murder trial.