TOKYO (TR) – Tokyo Metropolitan Police have arrested a bar host in the swindling of 1 million yen from an elderly woman in Tachikawa City, reports Nippon News Network (June 5).
In May, Keima Sato, 26, allegedly posed as the grandson of the woman, 83, on the telephone and falsely claimed he had lost bag with documents from his company. “I need 1 million yen,” he told her. He later collected that amount from the woman.
Sato, who has been charged with fraud, denies the allegations. “I don’t remember,” the suspect was quoted by police.
Police apprehended Sato after he tried the same ruse with a different woman living in Kanagawa Prefecture on the following day. Police had staked out a park that was to serve as the pickup point for the cash and took the suspect into custody upon his arrival.
Sato’s participation in the crime involving the woman in Tachikawa surfaced after police found a taxi receipt to her residence in his possession.
Police suspect Sato used similar means to swindle persons in four other cases.