TOKYO (TR) – The former CEO of medical equipment maker Olympus Corp. referred to him as “Samurai-san.” Yet rather than upholding the bushido code of trust he led to his downfall.
Earlier this year, Tokyo Metropolitan Police arrested Samurai-san, a drug dealer, for violating the Stimulants Control Act. During the investigation, police learned that the former CEO was one of his customers.
Last week, the company said that the former CEO, a German national, had stepped down from his post. According to weekly tabloid Shukan Bunshun (Nov. 7), it was Samurai-san who came forward to reveal the extensive drug use of the 56-year-old former CEO to the company — and supplied numerous text messages to prove his claims.
Unanimous decision
Headquartered in Hachioji City, Tokyo, Olympus is one of the world’s top manufacturers of medical equipment. The former CEO began serving as the company’s president and CEO in April 2023.
On June 18, investigators from the Tokyo Metropolitan Police’s Drug and Firearms Control Division conducted a search of the former CEO’s home. At the time, he denied using illegal drugs, and a urine test was conducted, but it did not come back positive.
That same day, Samurai-san was arrested for simple possession and use of methamphetamine. He was later handed a suspended prison term.
The matter did not surface within Olympus until months later.
At just after 10:00 a.m. on September 24, a package containing a letter that included the text “Request for a high-level investigation” arrived at the Hachioji headquarters of the firm. It had been sent by Samurai-san. The same documents were also mailed to the home of director Sumitaka Fujita, which caused the company’s upper management to became increasingly concerned.
“A similar document was also delivered to the apartment of [current chairman] Yasuo Takeuchi on the morning of September 22,” an Olympus source tells Bunshun. “These documents contained personal information about [the former CEO] that outsiders could not know.”
Among the documents were screenshots of 18 messages exchanged between the former CEO and Samurai-san on apps such as Telegram.
After seeing this, Takeuchi consulted with Tokyo Metropolitan Police and made the decision to proceed with an internal investigation.
The company’s board came to unanimous decision that the former CEO “likely engaged in behaviors that were inconsistent” with its code of conduct. On October 28, the company announced that the former CEO had resigned due to suspicions of purchasing illegal drugs.
Filming secret meetings
Bunshun learned about the former CEO’s drug use in February last year, after Samurai-san tipped off the magazine.
Over the course of the next 18 months, the magazine conducted its own investigation, which included filming secret meetings between him and Samurai-san on three occasions.
After he exited the company, the magazine conducted a 5-hour interview with his dealer to get the inside story.
In one case, a Bunshun reporter observed the former CEO and Samurai-san on a staircase overlooking the surrounding area near the former’s CEO’s residence in Minato Ward on the night of February 28, 2023.
For more than 15 minutes, the two of them could be seen negotiating with each other using gestures. At one point, the former seemed excited and left for a moment, but quickly returned.
Afterward, he stopped at an ATM at a convenience store, a minute’s walk away, before meeting up with Samurai-san again. He then handed the dealer the 200,000 yen he had withdrawn.
“Can you deliver this week?”
The pair negotiated such deals using the apps Signal and Telegram, which utilize advanced encryption technology. Around the time of the above encounter, they exchanged messages on Signal.
Among the messages from the former CEO were “Hi…can you deliver this week?” and “2bags from two weeks ago and one MD…right?”
“2bags” refers to two packets of cocaine, and “MD” refers to the synthetic drug MDMA.
In another exchange, the former CEO writes, “How many bags do you have?” Samurai-san responds, “1 bag and 1 piece. I’m ordering 4bags tmrw.”
In another, he writes, “That was risky…let’s meet somewhere else tonight and be careful.”
18 packets of cocaine per month
Born in Frankfurt, Germany in 1968, the former CEO began working at department store chain Karstadt after graduating from university. In May 2003, he joined Olympus. He then moved to Olympus Europe. Six years later, he was put in charge of the Eastern European market.
In 2022, Olympus sold two of its main businesses: its original scientific business, including microscopes, and its imaging business, including cameras. By focusing on selection and concentration, the company was reborn as a “Global Medtech Company.”
The former CEO was appointed as the second foreign president of Olympus by Takeuchi in April of last year. The first was Michael Woodford, who famously revealed an accounting fraud within the company in 2011.
A economics reporter tells Bunshun, “[His] strength is his speed. He advocates strong top-down decision-making. His executive compensation is extraordinary, at 1.138 billion yen, the 14th highest among listed companies in Japan.”
Samurai-san first met the former CEO in January of last year. At the time, he was the Chief Strategy Officer of the company, but the dealer initially did not know his identity, only that he was an important customer.
“I had his real name listed on another account in the app I was using to contact him,” the dealer says. “When I searched online, I found out that he was a director at Olympus. In April of the same year, there were reports that he was set to become president, and when I told him, he said, ‘Please don’t tell anyone about this fact.’ So we signed a contract.”
That contract stated that 18 packets of cocaine per month will be delivered to the former CEO for 600,000 yen. As well, a bonus of 2.4 million yen will be paid three times a year.
“The amount of cocaine ordered increased accordingly”
In addition to cocaine, the former CEO had a fondness for MDMA, which is usually used by couples to increase sexual excitement. For the former CEO, he preferred pills containing MDMA since he used them like a stimulant. “[MDMA] helps me more to stay focused and awake,” he wrote to Samurai-san.
A busy period was in March of last year, just before the annual shareholder’s meeting. “The amount of cocaine ordered increased accordingly,” Samurai-san tells Bunshun. “The contract’s 18 packets was not enough, and there were times when I delivered more than 30 packets a month.”
On the afternoon of March 2, 2023, the former CEO called Samurai-san to the Keio Plaza Hotel in Shinjuku Ward. The dealer had been warned beforehand that there would be many people related to the company and that he should not talk to him.
When Samurai-san met the former CEO, who was dressed in a suit, inside the hotel, he used eye contact to guide him to the bathroom on the first floor of the South Building. When he handed over a brown envelope containing cocaine, the former CEO ferried over another brown envelope containing a total of 500,000 yen.
After the former CEO assumed his post, he become more careful about where he and Samurai-san brokered deals.
The former CEO often chose a bench in Aoyama Cemetery late at night. If a light came on in the distance, the two of them hid behind a tombstone. They traded three or four times a week, and gradually the two built a strange relationship based on trust.
One day, the former CEO quoted a proverb from the book “Hagakure,” a practical and spiritual guide for what it means to be a warrior, and sent the following message, “Samurai-san, hold on to your bushido, don’t betray me, and trust me.”
“The quality has deteriorated”
Yet there were limits to the relationship. Despite being a good customer, the former CEO was frustrating his dealer with his demands.
After an order for LSD was placed, Samurai-san started to become exasperated. “By that time, [the former CEO] had become uncontrollable,” he tells Bunshun, “and he called me to a high-end steak restaurant in Kita-Aoyama, Minato Ward, and complained that the cocaine had impurities in it. He said, ‘It’s different from the last one. The quality has deteriorated.'”
That was not all. The former CEO also cautioned Samurai-san about the seriousness of their dealings.
“If our [illegal drug story] gets out, the stock price will drop to 1,000 yen,” the former CEO said in audio recording obtained by Bunshun. On that day, the stock price of Olympus, which is listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, was 2,255 yen.
The former CEO also cited challenges related to money.
“Because I pay taxes in Germany, my salary in Japan is not that high,” he said. “My salary is [paid] in Germany, so I don’t have any money in Japan. Please understand. I can’t move money from Germany to Japan, so my money will increase next year when I can sell my stocks.”
Negatively impacted his health
In early September last year, Samurai-san secured 152 packets of cocaine — with a street value of around 5 million yen — for the former CEO. However, the former CEO used all them over the next four months. Over a two-year period, he spent nearly 30 million yen on cocaine, Samurai-san told Bunshun.
In the midst of this, [the former CEO]’s extreme lifestyle had negatively impacted his health. On November 5, 2023, he sent the following message to Samurai-san: “I have health problems and I need to return to Germany in two weeks to undergo a medical examination. I would like five packets of cocaine delivered tonight or tomorrow.”
When he returned to Japan in mid-January this year, he asked for more drugs.
In May, Samurai-san asked an acquaintance who owned some of Andy Warhol’s works to discuss a scheme to sell them to Olympus at a high price through the former CEO. Then, on June 17, the two again exchanged ideas about reselling the paintings. However, the police raid took place that same day.
As to why Samurai-san revealed the former CEO’s drug use, he said he felt as if he had been taken advantage of.
“For the past two years, I have been exploited and used for convenience,” he says to Bunshunm, “and in the end, I have been betrayed and humiliated. Is it okay for such a person to be the head of a global company? Now I deeply regret having been involved with him and continued to be a drug dealer.”
