And we thought Johnny’s Jimusho was dodgy; Tokyo Damage Report gives the lowdown on the grime in the Visual Kei industry, from lack of contracts and “band rules” to money laundering. It’s not only the political world that takes cues from the yakuza:

In the beginning there was some – how do you say? – rivalry? between them, but they soon became friends, when they realized they could make more by working together. And of course that’s the exact system used by the Yakuza: controlling different parts of the country, but working together for maximum profit: “I’ll handle your businesses in my territory if you look after my businesses in yours!”

It’s a long interview, but definitely recommended reading for a look at a different side to a different subculture.

Read Tokyo Damage Report’s Interview with an ex-Visual Kei record executive

Jake Adelstein will be giving a book talk for Tokyo Vice, possibly including the reading of an unpublished chapter, at Temple University on Friday, March 5. The event is organized by Temple’s Institute of Contemporary Asian Studies and is open to the public. Hope to see both familiar and new faces there!

Click here for more info.

Tonight I suddenly understood a mystery which had been eating at me for the last four years.

As a high school exchange student in Nagoya I witnessed an event which left me rattled.  I was returning from a field trip with my class. We were across the street from Nagoya-station, waiting to cross to the station’s entrance when all of a sudden a burly man came, and for lack of any artistic phrase, literally kidnapped a middle aged salary man standing in front of me, grabbing him and pulling him away. Nobody did anything. Everyone stood where they were. Mind you, there were at least 30 people watching all of  this; high school students and adults on their way to work.

As this was four years ago, I was not yet fluent and felt incapable of expressing my disbelief in anything but English. I am ashamed that I was also one of the people momentarily paralyzed. But thankfully the shock wore off within seconds. Unfortunately, by that time the man was hauling off that salary man down the sidewalk to an alleyway. A fellow student and I quickly yelled at our teacher (sensei)  to do something. She refused.  Just then we remembered there was a koban (police box) across the street in Nagoya station. We ran to the koban and tried to give as coherent an explanation as possible recounting what we had witnessed. The policewoman thanked us, but we never learned what happened.

Back at school  I was furious no one had done anything. I yelled at people and expressed my disgust at all that had transpired that morning. I then turned to my sensei and asked her why she did nothing. She said, “He was probably yakuza. I don’t want to get involved!” At that time I knew nothing other then yakuza were Japan’s equivilent of the mob. Moreover, I did not know just how powerful the yakuza were and what the roles they played in Japanese society were. I was ignorant at best. Therefore I could not comprehend her answer. I could only see her and the other adults at the crime scene as having failed as ethical people.  And even though I read your book back in December, my realization that my sensei had true fears of all too real consequences for getting involved did not occur to me until tonight when I read your January 27th blog entry.  To this day I am still rattled by these memories.

I never told my parents what had happened. What was I supposed to say? “Oh, the day was good, but by the way a man standing next to me was abducted, and no one did anything to stop it.” I suppose it is because I felt guilty of not having done more at the time. It’s a shame that has bored a hole into me which I do not know what to do with.

Personally, I think that Sam did far more than most people would do in a similar situation. It’s not a bright idea to play hero when a yakuza is beating the crap out of someone but going to the police or calling 110 (the Japanese equivalent of 911) is certainly worth doing.  Whether the police will do anything is another issue.

For many years in Japan, the yakuza could do whatever they wanted; they were above the law–they were, in a sense, invisible. In certain places, they still are. We have received several letters from people with similar stories. The worst of the yakuza are the ones that have no qualms about attacking civilians, although the unwritten rule has always been “we don’t bother ordinary people” (かたぎにめいわくをかけない／堅気に迷惑をかけない）.  And lately some factions  don’t seem to be afraid of the police either.

The Kodokai has always been the most belligerent of Yamaguchi-gumi factions. Traditionally, relations between the police and the yakuza were civil. Police detectives visited the offices of organized crime members and had reasonably polite exchanges of information. When major crimes occurred, the yakuza groups involved would  would turn over the criminal over someone to take the rap, or someone willing to take the fall for the crime, and the person would make a full confession.

Contrary to traditional patterns, the Kodokai will not let police into their offices, their members are ordered to not make confessions, thus they do not confess and do not cooperate with law enforcement in any way, and their antagonism to the police is abnormal for organized crime groups in Japan.

When  In 2009, it became widely known that the Kodokai was collecting information on the police officers and detectives assigned to investigate them–photographing their families, tailing them to their homes, and illegally obtaining records of their car registration. The National Police Agency decided that action was warranted. Since 2006, local police officers have known that the Kodokai engaged in such practices but the NPA did not make an issue of it until recently. In 2007, while speaking to the FBI and the National Police Agency as a guest lecturer at the FBI Seattle bureau office, I mentioned the Kodokai harassment of the police and caused several NPA officers to turn green as their FBI counterparts grilled them as to  ”Why the f*ck do you let those guys get away with it?”  The NPA representatives didn’t have a good answer.

On September 29th, 2009, the NPA sent out a directive to police headquarters nationwide to concentrate their efforts on dismantling and policing not the Yamaguchi-gumi itself, but specifically the Kodokai. In a meeting the same day of organized crime division chiefs from across Japan, Ando Takaharu, the Commissioner General of the NPA stated: “The Kodokai has powered up their antagonistic stance towards law enforcement. They are the driving force behind the Yamaguchi-gumi,”  and suggested that crippling them would weaken the Yamaguchi-gumi. This remains to be seen.

Since the NPA announcement, the Yamaguchi has begun trying to cultivate a more positive image, giving the media better access to their annual rice-cake making party at headquarters, and doing things like distributing cash gifts to the local neighborhood children in Kobe in late December of 2009 as “New Year’s gifts” (otoshidama) from “Uncle Takayama”. This has been reported with a mixture of scorn and bemusement by the mainstream press.  The police, in particular, have not been amused. For many people, when the yakuza commit violent crimes in front of them, they simply pretend not to see it. A legitimate fear of retaliation and the lack of a witness protection program helps keep the yakuza invisible and keep the public “blind.” But these days, for the police at least, the yakuza aren’t invisible anymore. It may take some time for the general public to see them as well.

“He who is present at a wrongdoing and does not lift a hand to prevent it–he is as guilty as the wrongdoers.” —Apache Indian saying.

Tokyo Vice: The Australian Edition

If you have a few minutes and are interested in some of what didn’t make the book and some of what happened afterwords, give the interview a listen. Thanks to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation for asking some good questions. Thanks to Scribe Publications for that wonderfully “unique” cover. Ahem.

The accompanying article is below:

Tokyo Vice – a journalist in a crime underworld
By Robbie Buck

Imagine how tough it is to go to another country and try to eke out a career for yourself, especially if it’s a country with a different language and a vastly different culture, and then imagine if your job involved immersing yourself in the seediest and most crime-ridden parts of that country, only to have your life threatened on many occasion.
This picture is what American journalist Jake Adelstein’s life was like after having become the only reporter from the US to be admitted to the insular Tokyo metropolitan police press club and his harrowing experiences have been catalogues in his book Tokyo Vice: A Western reporter on the police beat in Japan.
He relates his relationship with yakuza bosses, including an ex-yakuza who is Adelstein’s bodyguard and driver so, “it’s kind of nice not having to drive, [so] there’s a good thing about having people want to kill you, sometimes,” he jokes.
Seriously, though, he points out that he had protection but, “the most scary thing is wondering who will they go after next.”
Things certainly do work differently in Japan and Adelstein notes that a key part of being a reporter on his round was visiting police at their homes, “you knock on the door, bring some Japanese sweets and have a chat over tea – that kind of give and take between police and reporters is part of information exchange [and] when you become a better reporter you bring the cops information they want and if it turns into a good case, you get the scoop.”
Adelstein had various sources for his book, though, and, “I don’t know how much of what some of my sources had told me were true,” but all he has been told makes for a murky picture of a dangerous world.
In fact, “there were some positive aspects of the reporting,” he modestly admits, as some of his work helped the Japanese Government look at human trafficking in that country.
He is now involved with a non-profit organisation that combats human trafficking in Japan and he is writing a new book called The Last Yakuza, a kind of biography of his bodyguard.

Hopefully they’ve got a few fond memories of the drink. But a new product known as “Tequila Balls,” born in Kabukicho and rising in popularity at Tokyo’s clubs and karaoke boxes, will likely drum up a few twinges of regret that they didn’t think of commercializing them first.

According to Shukan Bunshun, which reported on the product in January, Tequila Balls are the brainchild of an ex-host working at Kabukicho bar “NASUKA.” Although they look suspiciously like the jelly candies that hit the news a few years ago both in Japan and abroad after a series of choking accidents, these little bombs are 20% alcohol and contain 1/3 of a shot glass worth of tequila each. Website J-cast quotes the marketing manager as saying, “These were created for men who are looking to get women drunk with something that’s stylish and easy to drink.”

The venue unleashed their creation in 2008, and the balls were met with rave reviews from what is arguably a bar in Kabukicho’s largest clientele: hosts and hostesses. Things stayed relatively local until a NASUKA regular–who happened to be a model for the massively popular cabaret-style fashion magazine, Koakuma Ageha–posted on her blog about the party goodies. Calls suddenly started flooding in from around the country.

NASUKA had been creating Tequila Balls themselves and selling them to local cabaret and host clubs, wrote Shukan Bunshun. With the attention that came through the high-profile blog posting, however, they could no longer keep up with orders, eventually branching out into a production and mail-order service that sells the items starting at ¥2,205 for a set of 10. The brand has stuck to its roots as well, choosing ageha diva, fashion model and entrepreneur Momoka Eri as the face of Tequila Balls.

The Tequila Balls Web site says they’re currently available in orange, blueberry, yogurt, cassis and strawberry, but we’re hoping they’ll branch out into “berry blue” and “strawberry-kiwi.” Tequila jigglers, anyone?

You can light a cigarette with this bullet or just cause a heap of trouble.

20 minutes and five police cars later–a detective came up to the car, motioned the gang boss to get out. The detective had on white gloves and had the bullet in his hand.
“Mr. X, is this your bullet?”
“It’s not a bullet; it’s a lighter.”
“So you say.”
Mr. X noticed the white gloves the detective had on, which are usually only for crime scenes.
“What’s with the gloves?”

“Evidence. We don’t want to obscure your fingerprints on this bullet. You’re going down for violations of the Firearms and Ammunitions Law, pal…understand? Some serious jail time.”
Mr. X, says he was getting a little bit worried. The cop stared him in the face, and then the cop took a pack of Lark cigarettes out of his coat and handed a cigarette to Mr. X. Mr. X took the cigarette and put it in his mouth and the cop lit it with the bullet shaped lighter, laughing.
“Mr. X, pretty cool! I’ve never seen a lighter like this. Do you know where I can get one?”
“I could ask.”
“Yeah, let me know. By the way, you know we’re still going to seize this. Just to be sure. Gonna have to have forensics look at it.”
“Be my guest.”
And with that, Mr. X got back in his car and was allowed to leave.
Guns and weapons are taken very seriously in Japan, and bullet-shaped lighters are probably not a source of levity. When I heard this story, I thought I was going to have to go prostate myself in front of Mr. X again and was hoping not to hit my forehead too hard on the ground, but he told me he was more amused than upset. And he asked me to get him two more of the bullet-shaped lighters.

Pre-paid USB wifi cards from eMobile, one of several companies that offer the service.

According to an organized crime watchdog, police in Wakayama Prefecture have uncovered a child pornography ring that was able to set up a website selling DVDs by abusing the anonymity of pre-paid wireless Internet cards. Pre-paid Internet access through USB wireless modems are becoming increasingly popular, as use does not require a contract with a provider. Authorities arrested five members of the ring last month on violations of child prostitution and pornography laws, and are currently looking for a Yamaguchi-gumi affiliated gang member who they believe to be the ringleader.

Police say the group operated the website selling pornographic DVDs featuring girls under 18 and sold them for 1,000 yen each. Around 2,000 DVDs, a prepaid modem and prepaid mobile phone were found at the Gunma Prefecture home of one arrested man. Other suspects were apprehended in Nagasaki, Hiroshima and elsewhere, and are believed to have used Internet cafes as bases for their operations. Customers deposited money for orders into a personal bank account located in Fukuoka. Police are investigating the ring as a potential source of income for organized crime groups.

The Tokyo Managed Subway System May Soon Run 24/7

At the same time, merchants in Kabukicho, the former red-light district of Tokyo, located in Shinjuku are pushing to allow the area to be designated a special region where all businesses can stay open 24 hours a day. Currently, host and hostess clubs are forced to shutter their windows at one am. They are circumventing the laws by transforming the places into “girl’s bars” or “boy’s clubs” after hours, with stand up counters where customers can order drinks,–which makes them “bars” instead of cabarets, technically. Tokyo has a fair amount of latitude in how they run their own subway system, and while the 都営地下鉄 (toeichikatesu) routes are limited, if they run 24 hours a night there is a good chance they will become the last resort of the night owls and newly arrived passengers at Haneda. Longer hours should translate into more employment for the locals–and the cops as well.

Officers from the Metropolitan Police Department spotted the head of the gang affiliated with the Sumiyoshi-kai syndicate at Tokyo’s Ryogoku Kokugikan on Jan. 18. He moved after being prompted to do so by one of the information desk staff.

The gang boss was sitting in one of the ringside guest seats on the south side of the ring. These seats are normally reserved for individuals and companies that have contributed a certain amount to the Japan Sumo Association (JSA), and are not on sale to the public.

Police told reporters an interesting tidbit of information as to why they want to keep the mob out of the arena:

暴力団関係者が維持員席での観戦にこだわる理由について、捜査幹部は「相撲中継は刑務所でも見ることができる。土俵に近い維持員席はテレビに映りやすく、自分の姿を見せて服役中の組員を勇気づける狙いがあるのでは」と分析する。

Investigators said they deny organized crime members access to seats for donators because they believe that, “Sumo is broadcast even in jail; by sitting close to the ring and appearing on TV, gang leaders hope to cheer up and show support to members that are serving time.”

(From the Japanese Mainichi article)

Authorities are currently negotiating with the JSA as to whether or not they can prohibit yakuza in the general admission seats as well.

Police and the Japan Sumo Association have been actively trying to oust the yakuza from sumo since last July, when authorities were shocked to see elder members of the Yamaguchi-gumi sitting ringside at a tournament in Nagoya. The JSA made their first-ever retaliation against the yakuza in September at the annual autumn tournament, posting a sign denying entry to organized crime members. In October the group ammended their contracts with seat holders, adding a clause that allowed them to terminate special seats of anyone found to be related to the yakuza.

With some appropriate timing, there’s currently another frenzy going on regarding ex-yokozuna Takanohana, now a JSA member, who is currently steeped on controversey after he announced his intention to run for the JSA board of directors and was tossed out of the Nishonoseki stable group. Recently, weekly photo magazine “Flash” published photos of Takanohana at an event in Kobe in August, 2008, sitting next to a “head of an organized crime group.” Takanohana told the press that he was “invited be long-time supporters, and went because it was a memorial service for those who died in the Kobe earthquake.”

More info at Nikkan Sports (Japanese only)

Once upon a time, a famous yakuza journalist named Mizoguchi Atsushi, wrote some articles about a Yamaguchigumi (Japan’s largest organized crime group) faction. They are known as the Yamakengumi. These articles made the Yamakengumi very angry. So some thugs were sent to dispatch him. They couldn’t find him, so they stabbed his son. The same thing happened in the past with a man in the Seijo area who angered the Goto-gumi and fled–in his absentia, his wife was stabbed so severely that it was a miracle she didn’t die.  It’s still an open case.

Let’s get back to Mizoguchi. According to someone who knows about these turn of events, Mizoguchi became frantically worried about his family. And he also became very worried that he was going to be killed himself.  A yakuza boss made an effort to reassure, telling him to calm down.  This is what he allegedly said to Mizoguchi. “Calm down. Be a  man. Don’t worry, nobody is going to kill you. Not now.  It would be too obvious. We’ll have to wait five, ten,maybe fifteen years before doing it. So relax. For the next five years at least–no one will touch you.” Somehow, I don’t think he found that reassuring.

In March of 2008, I was at the trial of Goto Tadamasa on property forgery related charges. He was found not guilty. The original investigation started with looking into the brutal murder in broad daylight of a real estate negotiator named Nozaki, if memory serves me well.  The Goto trial collapsed when the central witness for the defense balked at the last minute.  I knew one of the cops waiting outside in the hall, and asked him what he thought of the verdict.  He had the following to say:

“The guy who was going be on the witness stand–it’s a shame he backed down. Because in a year or two, when enough time has gone by–he’ll vanish. If he’d taken the stand, he probably would have ended up dead anyway, but at least it would have been death with honor.  You can’t outrun the yakuza–you just make them chase you even harder when you turn your back.  You probably won’t win if you fight them either. But you might have a better chance.”

If you piss off certain yakuza groups, you’re never going to win the war–you may win a battle.  But eventually, you’ll lose. The only way you could win is to drive so hard that the entire faction is disbanded and that someone at the top of the organization decides you’re more trouble than you’re worth. You have to be a huge troublemaker to get that kind of free pass.

I know an ex-yakuza who used to be a loan shark and a collector as well. His point of pride was that he never bothered the family of the debtor, never leaned on them to collect the interest, never called up the mark in the middle of the night and woke up his kids, never stuffed a dead animal in their mailbox, never kidnapped family members or lovers of the debtor–no matter how much money was owed. “A man’s debts are his own problem.  If he owes me and won’t pay, I’ll take it out on him–not innocent people. If you have a fight with your mistress, you don’t beat up her brother. I’m not saying you beat up the woman either, you know.  I’m saying it’s dishonorable to pick on people who aren’t involved. There are no fair fights, of course, but there are honorable fights. No real yakuza is going to go after the friends or family of their enemy. Collateral damage as is unacceptable.  That’s how it should be.”

Well, how things should be and how they are, are never the same.  Maybe the old-school yakuza lived up to those ideals of “an honorable fight” but if that time ever existed, it’s the ancient past for most of them. You might think you’re only risking your personal safety when you get in their way but that’s terribly naive. Because when they realize that you aren’t afraid to get hurt or maybe even killed for doing what you think is the right thing, they’ll look for different leverage.  Maybe, they’ll leave you alone for a while because they are afraid that hurting you will anger the cops–and turn public opinion against them. But they won’t forgive and forget.

I should state things a little better here.  I don’t really think there’s anyone who isn’t afraid of physical pain or death. I sure hell as am. But there are some people still crazy enough to take the risk.  That’s when you put people in danger.  Why do you think the Kodokai, the strongest faction of the Yamaguchi-gumi, follows detectives to their homes, takes down their license plate numbers, and photographs members of their family? The message is very simple. Here it is:

“Nothing is just business. Everything is personal. If you bring the war to us, we’ll bring the war to you–right where you live. So don’t fuck with us.”  And they only have to demonstrate that once for people to get the point.  Expose how they make their money,  get some of them arrested, pass on information to the police about their criminal activities–whether it’s human trafficking or  just illegal gambling–and you will quickly learn how intolerant the noble yakuza can be.

No matter how tough you imagine yourself to be, the intangible pain you’ll feel when someone is hurt because of what you did, even if you were doing the right thing, will hurt like nothing you can imagine. It feels like an internal injury and it doesn’t get better. Unless you’re a sociopath, and then you don’t care about anyone else but yourself.  Maybe sociopaths make the best journalists in the world in that sense. They certainly are well-adapted to be yakuza.  A yakuza doesn’t even have to lay a finger on you to hurt you, he just has to let you know that he’s willing to hurt the people you care about. That’s enough. Sometimes, the fear of that happening is worse than when it really does happen. It keeps you up at night—it makes you want to avoid close relationships, it makes you lonely as hell, and it makes you vulnerable.  It can also make you a little crazy.

If they back up what they say, they can force you into a position where you feel the responsible thing to do is kill yourself.  I knew one man who I think was goaded into doing it, for fear of what would happen to his little boy if he didn’t.  That works perfectly for them–get your enemy to kill himself and you’ll never go to jail for murder. A perfect crime.

Takeshita Saburo, one of the yakuza to receive a liver transplant at UCLA, used to have a signature line when he was shaking down a deadbeat. He’d beat on their door, of their home, in the middle of the night, and yell, “Time to pay up.  I’ll make you a deal.  Just bring down your little daughter so I can cut off her face. Then we’ll be even.” Sometimes, he’s tap a knife on the door, which would emphasize the point, especially if it was a metal door.  Metal on metal, especially if you scratch on it with a knife–it’s an unpleasant sound.

But here’s the corollary on this: almost everyone has someone they love. Even gangsters. So when push comes to shove, here’s what you have to do. You have to figure out who is the top dog, you have to find out who he loves, and you have to demonstrate him that those people are vulnerable. The more of them you know, the stronger your position. He can’t watch them all.  And you have to let him know that you are willing to hurt them, by any means possible, if it comes to that. You also need to be able to show that even if you’re obliterated, there are good odds someone else will do the job for you.  And the most difficult thing to do of all, is that you may have to demonstrate that. At least once. It isn’t a good feeling, so I’ve heard.  It hardens a person. It takes you down to there level. It makes you play God and do triage with other people’s lives. You have to decide, if that’s the case, “the pain of person X is less significant than the possible pain or death of my friend.”  So what do you do?

There are no rules to gokudo chess.  It’s a betting game.  You don’t have a choice in what you might lose–they often believe they do.  They expect that YOU will fight fair. Once you’ve sat down at the table with a dishonorable player, you’re locked in until you reach a stalemate or only one of you is left standing. There is a referee but you can’t count on him. You have to win at all costs and that requires excellent strategy, sometimes physical intimidation, psychological warfare, and sometimes you have to cheat. The best way to do that is to know what your opponent doesn’t want to lose. And if he doesn’t mind losing everything, then you need to know what he fears.  Fear is more powerful than love for some people.

I keep thinking my chess game is over but then just when I’m ready to walk away from the table, it seems like someone else wants to play. I never liked chess very much. And being forced to play, makes you think more and more about waiting until the referee leaves the room, and beating your opponent to death with the chess board. That would be a total victory.  No more rematches.

I’ve gotten some letters that lambaste me for putting people in danger, including my family, and a number of morally questionable things I did. Well,  I did what I had to do and I believe in my work as an investigative journalist and with some NGOs. Of course, I’m not happy to put people in uncomfortable situations.  But if everyone runs, than the whole world gets taken over by the bad guys.  And then nobody wins. There are people who deal with organized crime issues in Japan that move their families out of the country. They don’t quit their jobs. I admire that.  I might not be a great father but I don’t want to teach my kids that when the bullies of the world come calling that the honorable thing is to capitulate.

An honorable victory is the ideal. Sometimes that isn’t possible.  Hopefully, gentle reader, you’ll never find yourself in this position–but if you have to deal with someone willing to hurt your friends or lovers or family, because they can’t get at you–you have to show them that you can do the same thing–and that may stop them. And that’s an unpleasant lesson to learn.

Best to avoid that part of life’s education, when humanly possible.