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Roppongi talent agency arrest reveals under side of entertainment biz

Friday June 5
Friday June 5

Last month, Tokyo Metropolitan Police announced the arrest of a former president of talent agency Sending for sexually violating a 15-year-old aspiring female model on multiple occasions last year.

The suspect is a 37-year-old national of the Philippines going by the name Jin Tashiro. Weekly tabloid Friday (June 5) says the suspect routinely abused prospective employees — a dark reality in a very dark industry.

Sending, located in Tokyo’s Roppongi entertainment district, published the fashion magazine Jiggy. For an insider’s view of the agency’s operations, Friday speaks with a former model for the magazine who auditioned for Tashiro in the summer of 2013.

“I was told that I would not be exclusively attached to the magazine,” says “Maki,” a pseudonym. “However, it was suggested that I agree to pay a consulting fee of one million yen and be his ‘girl.'”

The agreement was supposed to be temporary. It stipulated that the 25-year-old undertake a three-month training program before becoming a “regular model.”

She was initiated into the industry quickly.

“Before signing, I went to a studio in Yotsuya,” she tells the magazine, which reprints a redacted version of her contract with Sending. “He escorted me out to the emergency staircase and dropped his pants. He then forced me to provide a blow-job.” (An acquaintance of Tashiro tells Friday that he refers to the studio as his “romping room,” a place where condoms were routinely spread out on the floor.)

Maki transferred 300,000 yen to his bank account as an advance payment of the consulting fee. In September, she made her debut as a model in the Jiggy’s first issue.

It was at this point that Tashiro’s perverted behavior escalated.

“After the shoots, he’d telephone to find where I was,” she remembers. “We’d meet and head over to parks, in between buildings, into open fields — and he’d want a piece of my body.”

The pair also met for illicit encounters in love hotels.

“Another model would join us for three-way sessions,” Maki says. “While two of the three engaged in sex, the other was required to film the action with a camera. He’d also demand lesbian action.”

For prospective models who cannot pay the consulting fee, Tashiro provided the option of working at a fuzoku (sex-related) establishment through his recommendation. That was the case for Maki.

Anri Sakaguchi on the cover of Jiggy
Anri Sakaguchi on the cover of Jiggy

“I wound up at hotels with strange men for between 50,000 and 60,000 yen a session,” she says. “After four months, I paid Tashiro 700,000 yen.”

In spite of this, Maki was still never granted exclusive status. When she told him she was done with the sex trade, he said that’s fine as, in his words, “there are plenty more where you came from.”

In the end, Maki appeared in two issues of Jiggy and was compensated a total of 13,000 yen. The latest — and likely last — issue of the magazine features model and actress Anri Sakaguchi on the cover, which also includes an enticement for readers to join the Jiggy Model Academy.

According to Maki, the number of victimized models and idols — Sending also served as an agency for idol group Ange until it broke up prior to Tashiro’s arrest —- totals 40. Dubbed the “Jun Tashiro Victims,” the group is considering litigation against for the former president.

Prior to his arrest, Tashiro denied any wrongdoing. “It is all a fabrication to crush me,” he reportedly said. (K.N.)

Source: “Kokuhatsu ‘geino puro shacho ni 100 man-en torarete okasa re tsudzuketa,’” Friday (June 5)