TOKYO (TR) – Tokyo Metropolitan Police have busted a courier service in which messengers were used in the swindling of dozens of victims in the Kanto area, reports TBS News (Mar. 17).
In August of last year, Masato Tsuda, the manager of ASAP, and two other associates allegedly defrauded a woman, aged in her 70s and living in Nishi-Tokyo City, out of one million yen after impersonating one of her grandchildren on the telephone. “I lost a bag containing company money,” one of them falsely claimed in a scam known as ore ore sagi, or “it’s me fraud.”
According to police, Tsuda gave the instruction that the money be retrieved by a messenger using one of the company’s motorcycles. Tsuda denies the charges, telling police he “does not recall the incident.”
Police suspect that Tsuda utilized similar means in swindling about 30 persons in Tokyo and Kanagawa Prefecture out of around 80 million yen since March of last year.
