TOKYO –
A 26-year-old yakuza member suspected of sending younger ladies he met in Tokyo’s Kabukicho leisure district to Cambodia to work as phone scammers has been arrested for the eighth time, this time on suspicion of conspiring with two ladies to defraud a person in his 30s of 9.5 million yen.
The suspect, Teruto Yamao, is a member of a bunch affiliated with the Sumiyoshi-kai, certainly one of Japan’s designated organized crime syndicates.
According to the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department, Yamao allegedly conspired with a 20-year-old girl from Nagoya and a 22-year-old girl from Kushiro, Hokkaido, each of whom have been additionally rearrested, to deceive the sufferer in January 2026.
The suspects allegedly impersonated law enforcement officials and officers from the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications throughout phone calls, falsely telling the person that he was beneath suspicion of cash laundering and that authorities wanted to look at the cash in his checking account.
The sufferer was allegedly persuaded at hand over a complete of 9.5 million yen.
Investigators stated the 2 ladies had met Yamao whereas frequenting an space often known as “Toyoko” close to the Shinjuku Toho Building in Kabukicho, a gathering place for younger folks, together with youngsters and others who spend time on the streets.
The ladies have been subsequently despatched to Cambodia, the place they’re believed to have labored as phone operators, recognized in Japan as “kakeko,” making fraudulent calls to victims.
Yamao had beforehand been arrested on suspicion of offenses together with kidnapping folks he had met by means of connections within the Toyoko space for the aim of forcing them to work as phone scammers abroad.
The newest case marks his eighth arrest as police proceed investigating his suspected involvement in recruiting younger folks in Japan for abroad fraud operations.
Source: TBS