PHILIPPINES (TR) – In June 2023, the Fukuoka Summary Court issued a warrant for the arrest of Miyako Iwamoto.
According to the warrant, Iwamoto was among the suspects who repeatedly posed as police officers on the telephone and scammed elderly persons out of large amounts of cash.
Fast forward to October 7 of this year, when police arrested Iwamoto and four other Japanese nationals.
Video obtained by the site for weekly tabloid Friday (Oct. 17) shows the scene that night, when the five Japanese men and women — dressed casually in t-shirts and shorts — were taken into custody.
The site reports that the apprehension of the five suspects is the latest effort by local authorities to round up Japanese nationals who have fled to this Southeast Asian nation for the purpose of criminal activities.
SIM cards
The five suspects are believed to be members of a ring that carries out tokushu sagi (specialized fraud) from a base in in Quezon Province, about a three-hour drive south of central Manila.
Perpetrators of this crime target a victim over the telephone and impersonate an authority figure or relative to defraud money from them.
A stack of documents was on a table at an apartment used by the ring. A senior official from the Philippine Immigration Bureau, holding the documents, explained in Tagalog to the surrounding investigators, “This is a list of phone numbers they use to call into Japan.”
The word “list” was printed in hiragana in the upper left corner of the document, followed by personal information such as name, year of birth, address and phone number. Next to the phone numbers, words like “young” or the letter “R” were written and some were crossed out. This likely indicates that the calls were not connected or the person was not at home. A large number of SIM cards were also found among the five suspects.
“The five continued to commit specialized fraud using the apartment as a hideout until shortly before their arrest. Personal information lists and SIM cards prove this,” the immigration official continued.
According to official documents, the five arrested were Iwamoto, 34, Noriyuki Harada, 48, Nobuyuki Arima, 45, Yuya Yano, 33, and 33-year-old Ayumu Osawa.
Four hideouts
The immigration official went on regarding the circumstances that led to their arrests, “We had known Harada’s location for about a month. This time, we first went to Harada’s hideout and forced him to reveal the locations of the other four before arresting them. There were four hideouts in total.”
The five had connections with JP Dragon, a local criminal organization of delinquent Japanese nationals.
A photo obtained by Friday shows a party on the rooftop of a building, with whiskey bottles and other items lined up on a table. JP Dragon executive Tomohiro Koyama, 51, who is now serving a three-and-a-half-year prison sentence for theft, and Iwamoto are in the photo.
A source familiar with the situation said: “This was taken at a fireworks festival held at the end of the year about three years ago. Dozens of JP Dragon members and dancers were gathered on the balcony of Yoshioka’s house.”
“Dark businessman”
“Yoshioka” refers to Ryuji Yoshioka, 55, the head of JP Dragon, who was arrested in the Philippines in June of this year. Yoshioka was involved in gambling on cockfights and restaurant management. He was known as a “dark businessman” in the Japanese community in the Philippines.
Within JP Dragon, Iwamoto allegedly headed a hako (box) for committing specialized fraud that consisted of four underlings. She held an influential position, with some calling her the “female version of JP Dragon.”
However, Iwamoto’s situation was a bit complicated, as the immigration official continued: “Iwamoto confessed that she had a child, a young boy. At the time of the arrests, a Filipino accomplice was looking after the child, so he wasn’t present at the scene.”
“Gave birth in Japan”
The boy is now 5 years old. A former caller kakeko for the ring who knew Iwamoto in the Philippines said, “In the Philippines, she used the alias ‘Asuka.’ She was incredibly good at playing the role of a caller, pretending to be a Financial Services Agency employee. She had a child with another caller, gave birth in Japan and returned to the Philippines with the child.”
In February 2020, she took her then six-month-old child to the Philippines and raised him while continuing to commit specialized fraud.
The immigration official said, “We are currently working with the Japanese Embassy in the Philippines to place Iwamoto’s child in an appropriate facility.”
Philippine investigative authorities have arrested at least 16 Japanese suspects involved in specialized fraud this year. Despite this, JP Dragon members remain hidden in the Philippines. The second-in-command, after Yoshioka, remains at large. The immigration official said, “We don’t know how many more there are.”
