Frisky stylist forces woman to give him a grope

A woman who had gone for a trim at a hair salon in Tochigi prefecture Monday and agreed to a massage ended up with a handful more than she bargained for. According to reports, the 28-year-old salon assistant who was attending to the customer brought her to a shampoo chair and placed a towel over her face before offering to give a hand massage. After receiving the customer’s hand, the man proceeded to place it on his clothed genitals. The stylist was arrested under charges... Read More

Tale of the celebrity cannibal

The Korean custom of eating dogs is something that on occasion mistakenly gets loaded on to the Japanese. To the French and Dutch in the summer of 1981, mention of the Japanese likely brought to mind one individual who ate a completely different type of meat–human. Issei Sagawa had just completed a semester of study at the Sorbonne Academy in Paris, France, when he invited his Dutch classmate Renée Hartevelt to dinner. Sagawa shot and killer her, then spent the next three... Read More

Yamaguchi-gumi number two arrested

Just some quick news: Kiyoshi Takayama, second in command of the Yamaguchi-gumi, was arrested Thursday during a raid of his home in Kobe. Read here and here. More information to follow!  Read More

Injured Sapporo groper identified by teeth marks

Telltale teeth marks from a feisty victim pinned a Sapporo man on charges of indecent assault, despite his denial of the crime during questioning. The 30-year-old man is suspected of having restrained a 28-year-old woman for the purpose of molesting her, groping her body and leaving minor injuries to her face just after midnight on November 14. According to police, during the struggle the woman was able to bite him on the left hand before he escaped. The man was picked up by police... Read More

The high price of writing about the yakuza–and those who pay. 猪狩先生を弔う日々

By Jake Adelstein “In life, we only encounter the injustices we were meant to correct.” Igari Toshiro, ex-prosecutor, leading lawyer in the anti-organized crime movement in Japan. 1949-2010. Igari Toshiro, was my lawyer, my mentor, and my friend. In the sixteen years I’ve been covering organized crime in Japan, I’ve never met anyone more courageous or inspiring–or anyone who actually looked as much like a pit-bull in human form. Igari-san was a legend in the... Read More

Tokyo Vice: Now in.. Hungarian!

Jake Adelstein’s epic tale of a foreign cub reporter’s climb Japan’s underbelly is now available in Hungarian! We can’t decipher anything about it without the aid of Google Translate, but fingers crossed that the reaction is good. Adding to the US edition, UK edition, Australia/New Zealand edition and the German edition, that makes the fifth region that can now read about Jake’s infamous exploits in their native tongue, and I’m sure he’s... Read More

Dissatisfied customer reports 'Deri-heru' manager to police

Police arrested the manager of a Shinjuku “delivery health” prostitution business Thursday after they received a call from a customer complaining that the services offered were a rip-off. The 35-year-old customer told police the manager had gotten his attention by saying he could “go all the way”, but when he arrived at the small room rented for the encounter, a woman different than the one agreed upon appeared to perform services. The suspect testified,... Read More

Yakuza imposters arrested after tip from sumo association

Two men were arrested for impersonating yakuza and threatening staff at the grand sumo tournament held in May at Kokugikan in Ryogoku. The two men, ages 39 and 45 and both from Tochigi prefecture, reportedly threatened a vendor who was attending nearby customers during a match on May 14. The two men demanded souvenir booklets, usually distributed after the match is finished, and got angry when the vendor refused,  telling him they’d call some young thugs and start a fight.... Read More

Explosion rocks Yamaken-gumi office, gang claims no video footage

As many who are up on their Japan news probably saw, there was an explosion Monday morning at an office owned by the Yamaguchi-gumi affiliated Yamaken-gumi. Thus far, the Mainichi is the only place to have an English-language story up about the incident: Police rushed to the office of the Yamaken-gumi gang, which is affiliated with the Yamaguchi-gumi criminal syndicate, in Kobe’s Chuo Ward after a resident nearby reported the sound of a blast and that their house windows... Read More