TOKYO (TR) – Tokyo Metropolitan Police have arrested a male antique dealer over the alleged attempted robbery of a woman he met online last year, reports the Sankei Shimbun (May 12).
At around 10:00 p.m. on December 12, Mitsuru Oki, 64, got into a scuffle with the woman, aged in her 30s, inside a hotel room in Shinjuku Ward. He also tried to steal her bag containing about 17,000 yen in cash.
The woman was not hurt in the incident, the Shinjuku Police Station said.
Upon his arrest on Wednesday, Oki denied the allegations. “There was no violence from me,” he told police.
According to police, Oki lives in Nishi Shinjuku. After meeting the woman online, they agreed to engage in a relationship known as “papakatsu,” a form of compensated dating.
Prior to the incident, Oki paid the woman. However, he then demanded his money back since the woman resembled someone he had a bad experience with in the past.
After the incident, a staff member from the hotel alerted police.