TOKYO (TR) – Two men have been arrested for allegedly posing as members of law enforcement while attempting to take funds from a woman that they claimed she obtained through illegal means, reports TBS News (Sept. 7).
On August 18, Takahiro Adachi, 31, and his accomplice conspired to obtain 2.7 million yen in cash from the 29-year-old victim by posing as a detective on the telephone and telling her she was “suspected of accepting dirty money.”
Adachi, who has been accused of attempted fraud, denies the allegations, telling Tokyo Metropolitan Police that he acted as a lookout for a fraud ring.
Police said the suspects also posed as public prosecutors and Financial Services Agency officials in other cases.
In carrying out the ruse with the aforementioned woman, the suspects told the victim that she had been accused of damages of 1.8 billion yen over a fraud and that she needed to withdraw money to be cleared, Nippon News Network reported (Sept. 7).
Two cases involving the same scam were also reported last month in Chiba Prefecture, police said, adding a total of 107 cases have been reported, mostly in the Kanto region, since late July.