Talent company Johnny & Associates Inc mentioned Thursday it can maintain a press convention on Sept 7 to answer suggestions from an exterior probe it set as much as assessment allegations its deceased founder sexually abused younger boys beneath its care.
The investigative crew mentioned in its conclusions issued Tuesday that pop mogul Johnny Kitagawa had sexually abused teenagers within the agency’s Johnny’s Jr. division for upcoming expertise from the early Seventies via to the mid-2010s.
The press convention would be the company’s first over the difficulty.
Allegations in opposition to Kitagawa, who died in 2019, have undergone renewed scrutiny in Japan after the BBC aired a documentary in March that includes interviews with a number of individuals claiming to have been abused by him.
The probe’s report into operations on the firm, one in every of Japan’s most profitable expertise businesses, beneficial that its head Julie Keiko Fujishima, Kitagawa’s niece, stand down over considerations their familial ties would compromise organizational makes an attempt to reform within the scandal’s wake.
Fujishima’s deceased mom Mary Yasuko Fujishima, Kitagawa’s older sister, was cited within the report as a significant component within the long-term concealment of sexual abuse on the agency.
The panel’s head, former Prosecutor General Makoto Hayashi, informed reporters Tuesday that the siblings had “overwhelming power” and “fostered an organization where governance was not effective.”
It additionally known as on the corporate to ascertain a system for offering redress to people coming ahead with claims of abuse. Because Kitagawa is lifeless, the proposed framework wouldn’t require victims to come back ahead with typical requirements of rigorous authorized proof.
The report from the impartial panel got here after a U.N. human rights delegation in early August issued its personal conclusions concerning the corporate following interviews in Japan with a number of alleged victims.
Among its findings, it mentioned it heard “deeply alarming allegations” that a number of a whole bunch of the company’s abilities have been sexually exploited and abused.
Acts managed by Johnny & Associates embrace a few of the greatest boy bands within the historical past of Japanese pop music, together with SMAP, Arashi and Hey! Say! JUMP.
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