TOKYO (TR) – As a part of an investigation into a fraud ring carried out by the Kodo-kai criminal syndicate, police have re-arrested a key member of the gang, reports TBS News (Feb. 12).
In August, 2018, Yoshiharu Takamatsu, a 47-year-old upper-level member of the Takami-gumi, an affiliate of the Kodo-kai, allegedly participated in the swindle of 4 million yen from a 79-year-old woman in Yokohama City.
The gang is believed to have been part of a ring that carried out what is called tokushu sagi, or special fraud, whereby victims are targeted over the telephone.
Police first arrested Takamatsu last year, when he was accused of participating in the swindle of another 79-year-old woman in Saitama City out of 500,000 yen in November, 2018.
As a part of the investigation into the latter case, police arrested seven members of the Nishiyama-gumi, another affiliate of the Kodo-kai, last October 30. Officers also raided the Kodo-kai headquarters in Nagoya.
As the investigation progressed, police learned that Takamatsu ordered the members of the Nishiyama-gumi to carry out the swindle, according to the Sankei Shimbun (Nov. 12, 2019).
Yamaguchi-gumi
The Kodo-kai is an affiliate of the Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan’s largest syndicate. Takamatsu is a close associate of Teruaki Takeuchi, the chairman of the Kodo-kai.
Takeuchi is now positioned as a wakagashira, or a boss in line to succeed Shinobu Tsukasa of the Yamaguchi-gumi as the the gang’s next Godfather. Upon the first arrest of Takamatsu last year, a source told Shukan Bunshun (Nov. 28, 2019) that the police might be getting close to arresting Takeuchi.
