Entertainment world to follow sumo in baseball betting clampdown

As the world of sumo continues to grapple with revelations that wrestlers routinely gambled on baseball games, weekly tabloid Shukan Jitsuwa (Sep. 2) reports that police authorities are now targeting entertainers for the same illegal activity.

A former member of a gangster organization is at the center of a police investigation.

“The Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department seems to know which entertainers are involved in baseball betting,” says a person related to the investigation. “And in tracking them down, it all is going back to the same former gangster. So he is the key guy in the betting scheme.”

Among those suspected to be partaking are a famous idol and an enka singer.

“The idol is a huge fan of the Yomiuri Giants,” explains a production manager at a big firm. “He’ll wager around 20 or 30,000 yen on Giants games. Even though the amounts are small, that is still betting. The enka singer owns his own team, and he loves betting. He’ll put down one million yen a week. He’s even been getting enka composers involved.” Read more

Summertime, and the hookin’ looks easy, Johns are jumpin’ and the gals are high

A young girl plying the trade known as enjokosai, or compensated dating, is hardly new. Yet, observes Shukan Jitsuwa (Aug. 19), the glut of school gals on summer break and the harsh economy are combining to make present conditions in Tokyo anything but a seller’s market.

The tabloid cites the entertainment areas of Shinjuku, Ikebukuro and Shibuya as common hot spots. Many young females migrate from the countryside and must offer sharp discounts, or gekiyasu enko, as slashed bonuses for salaried workers have become the norm.

Seated on a street corner is a 19-year-old from Niigata Prefecture. “I came to Tokyo to earn money for one week,” says the brown-haired girl. “I have only have a few hundred yen. Tonight I can’t find anyone. If someone will pay 5,000 yen and the hotel fee that’s acceptable…”

In Shibuya, the writer finds a deeply tanned female in a miniskirt. She does not offer sex, only hand-jobs, and handles five customers a day. Referred to as tekoki enko, the service costs 3,000 yen a pull. Read more

Kanagawa hubby arrested on heels of honeymoon for hiring hooker

Sometimes, begins Shukan Jitsuwa (Aug. 12), there are places you’d just rather not be.

On July 19, that was certainly the case for a 37-year-old employee at a life insurance firm from Kanagawa Prefecture. He was arrested by police from the city of Seya for violating prostitution and pornography statutes by hiring an underage prostitute. But that’s not all: The apprehension occurred two days after he returned from his honeymoon and in the “loving embrace” of his new wife.

“He’s a director of sales and has 15 people under him at the Odawara branch of AXA Life Insurance,” explains a newspaper reporter who covers the police beat in Kanagawa. “He’s suspected of paying 25,000 yen on April 7 for a romp in an Ebina City love hotel with a 17-year-old girl he met on a matchmaking site.”

The suspect was married on July 7 and departed on his honeymoon to Hawaii thereafter. The couple returned to their new home in Odawara 10 days later. Read more

Busted Tokyo call-girl service’s VIP customer list has cops licking chops

On June 3, the Tokyo MPD’s vice squad slapped the cuffs on a baker’s dozen of people allegedly involved in call-girl ring. Shukan Jitsuwa (June 24) reports that Michinori Matsushita (age 31), the operator, was charged with having sent a 27-year-old “campaign girl” to service four male customers at hotels in Tokyo’s Shibuya district between March 18 and May 23.

But the cops were astonished to find that the scale of the operation was a lot more than they had bargained for.

“The club operated under 13 different names,” a crime reporter for a daily newspaper is quoted as saying. “The number of registered club members was about 27,000, and its revenues over the past two years is estimated to have exceeded 1 billion yen.”

The secret of the success of club “Innocent,” or “White Love” — or any of the other names by which Matsushita marketed his ladies — was that it delivered a high-quality product. He is reported to have maintained a stable of 200 females, many of whom, he claimed, worked in show business or as fashion models. Read more

Akasaka Prince orgy organizers in need of new romping rooms

Students of architecture might have shed a tear or two when it was announced last month that the Kenzo Tange-designed Grand Prince Hotel Akasaka will close early next year. Yet certain regulars illicitly utilizing the suite rooms of the 40-floor, wedge-shaped structure in Tokyo’s Chiyoda Ward may also be lamenting its demise, reports Shukan Jitsuwa (May 27).

Considered a high-end hotel throughout Japan, it is known as a Mecca for newlyweds, those engaging in affairs, escort ladies and participants in sex parties, which have proved to be particularly popular in recent times.

“It offers pricing plans starting at 7,000 yen,” explains a journalist specializing in the economy, “but there have been a lot of days with empty rooms over the last couple years. That’s why organizers renting the suite rooms for orgies are considered good customers.” Read more

TV Tokyo talent dispensing deri heru services in Shibuya?

The claims from a caller dialing Shukan Jitsuwa’s tip desk were most tempting: “Right now I am in a love hotel for a deri heru service with a girl who resembles an idol I’ve seen on television. I have to say that it really looks like her! I’d like for you to confirm whether I am correct or not! We are in Shibuya at…”

Being a magazine that frequently covers the activities of call girls, as a deri heru gal might be best described, such an offer for the tabloid proved too irresistible to ignore and for an article appearing in its Apr. 22 issue a reporter was dispatched to the scene within one hour.

Upon arrival the couple were in the midst of exiting the lobby — at least a male matching the description conveyed over the phone was accompanied by a shapely lass in stockings, high heels and a long winter coat (as she was seen to be wearing in a pair of grainy black and white photos supplied by the tabloid).

That gal, the reporter concluded, was talent Urara Hanazono. A writer specializing in the idol beat, who joined Shukan Jitsuwa’s main reporter at the scene, gave his stamp of approval on the identification. Read more

Shibuya AV company president arrested for rape

The president of an adult video (AV) company based in Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward was taken into custody by officers from the Harajuku Police Station on March 25 for rape, reports Shukan Jitsuwa (Apr. 15).

The incident, whose victim was an aspiring models, occurred during an interview last July in the company’s headquarters, located inside an apartment building. The tabloid says the president, 49, uses the pseudonym Tsunehiko Origuchi. Sankei Sports (Mar. 26) indicates that the suspect’s real name is Koki Yamaguchi, residing in Tokyo’s Setagaya Ward, and that the victim is 20 years old.

(The company’s name is not provided but the Shukan Jitsuwa article includes a screen grab of the Web page for Ballon-Blue.)

Origuchi usually uses the name ‘Ryutaro Higuchi’ when scouting. “When he started, he scouted AV girls on a freelance basis,” explains a person connected to the AV industry to the weekly. “In one week, he could pull in 10 beauties. He was making six million yen in a month. From that time, he became really famous in the AV production industry. So a lot of companies were utilizing his services. However, he behaves badly with women; he’s always banging the actresses. Because of that, the companies don’t keep him around for a long time.” Read more

Tokyo pink salons providing delectable deri heru substitute

This claim from a fuzoku writer — that is, one specializing in the sex industry — sounded far too appealing for Shukan Jitsuwa (Apr. 8) to ignore: “There’s a pink salon in Otsuka serving more than 200 customers a day. In this economy, that is unbelievable.”

Naturally, the tabloid felt obligated to investigate the premises, located in Tokyo’s Toshima Ward — no name for the establishment is given but a Google search reveals a few candidates — and discovered that Japan’s ongoing deflation has sent cash-strapped patrons stampeding to pink salons in favor of deri heru (out-call) sex services.

For the uninitiated, a pink salon supplies non-coital sexual services, while deri heru call girls are a bit more comprehensive.

“Since last summer, fuzoku prices have fallen like a rock,” says that same sex scribe. “In Tokyo, standard deri heru fees have dropped from 15,000 yen for 60 minutes to 10,000 yen for 40 minutes. The smaller outlay is appealing to customers. But these days, even that can’t top the reasonable fees charged by a pink salon.”

Unlike deri heru, prices have not changed, but the services rendered have been boosted. Patrons can now expect turns with three different ladies — referred to as 花びら回転 (hanabirakaiten, or literally flower petal rotation) — an increase over the two that was once the industry standard. Read more

Relationship breaker-upper for hire gets his day in Tokyo court

On March 9, the Tokyo District Court found Takeshi Kuwabara, age 31, guilty of strangling to death Rie Isohata (then age 32) in April of last year.

According to Shukan Jitsuwa (Apr. 1), Kuwabara had met Isohata while employed as a wakararesase-ya (professional relationship destroyer) by a company based in Tokyo’s Toshima Ward. His client, the woman’s estranged husband, had retained the company to break up her cohabitation with a Tochigi man begun two years earlier.

Tailing Isohata into a supermarket, Kuwabara feigned a chance encounter, flashing a brilliant smile followed by this pick-up line: “Excuse me, but might you be able to direct me to a shop around here that sells tasty cheesecake?”

He then introduced himself as a businessman working in the IT sector, and the two hit it off. Read more

Gasp! Zap!! Ah!!! AED-equipped sex shop in Osaka keeps geezers’ hearts ticking

Japan’s fuzoku sex businesses have not only been forced to confront the worst recession in decades; they must also contend with flaccid demand due the aging of society.

But at last, a glimmer of good news. Shukan Jitsuwa (March 18) reports that a shop in Osaka’s Tennoji district has found a way to put a completely new spin on the term “safe sex.” To enable sensual seniors to partake in sleaze with less risk of dying in the saddle so to speak, hotetoru “Pearl Diamond” installed an emergency defibrillator unit (AED) on its premises earlier this year.

A hotetoru, for the uninitiated, is an abbreviation of hotel toruko, typically an unlicensed sex shop that arranges sudsy, soapland-style trysts between gals and their johns on the premises of hotels.

“All of our staff have been instructed in the basics of AED operation,” the shop’s manager boasts. “Fortunately up to now we’ve never had to use it, but it’s there just in case. Our girls like having it too — I suppose it helps take a load off their minds.” Read more

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