TOKYO (TR) – In an unprecedented move that sent shockwaves through Japan’s underground nightlife districts, the Marine Group — the operator of nation’s largest chain of soapland bathhouses — abruptly shut down all 21 of its locations simultaneously at exactly 9:00 p.m. on January 30.
At 9:00 p.m. on that day, a message on chat app Line sent to current staff members cited “financial difficulties” as the reason for the closures, bringing to an end decades of history.
The sudden collapse of the empire, presided over by Japan’s notorious “Sex Industry King,” has left hundreds of female sex workers and staff members jobless and on the streets, reports the site for weekly tabloid Friday (Feb. 10).
“Wandering the streets now”
At exactly 9:00 p.m., the lights in the buildings went out. Women were swiftly forced out of the premises, with many unable to retrieve their personal belongings such as makeup and hair irons.
“Girls couldn’t even pack up their things, they were just shut out right at 9 p.m.,” one insider lamented. “Some branches had over 100 women on the roster. They are all wandering the streets now.”
Social media was flooded with similar cries of anguish from women who’d suddenly lost their jobs. “Wait, I still have my expensive shampoo and hair iron left at the store lol,” one woman wrote. “I can’t go get it. I’m screwed.” Another asked, “What about my pay this month? You’ve got to be kidding me about ‘financial difficulties.’ It was so busy last week.” A third woman wrote, “If I get kicked out of the dorm, I’ll definitely be homeless. Someone help me.”
Flagship outlet in Mito
The Marine Group is run by the Morishita Group, which is led by Keiichi Morishita, the so-called “Sex Industry King.” In addition to sex-related businesses, the group is known for operating a wide range of businesses, including the telephone club (terekura) Rinrin House, the ramen chain Hakata Furyu and the Robot Restaurant, an entertainment show facility in the Kabukicho red-light district.
As far as its commercial sex businesses, the Marine Group had recently been aggressively expanding its footprint nationwide, capitalizing on the financial distress of local soapland outlets during the COVID pandemic by buying them out.
The chain was famous for its flashy primary-color facades and heavily advertised cut-rate pricing, boasted by promotional slogans like, “Ikebukuro’s Cheapest: 10,000 yen for 40 minutes.”
It was around this time that the group unveiled its flagship Marine Palace Mito in Ibaraki Prefecture, an enormous facility built at a cost of 1 billion yen.
Industry insiders strongly suspect the synchronized shutdown was a calculated move by top management to evade a looming police raid and massive asset forfeiture.
Kabukicho
There is a basis for this theory.
In the early 2000s, the Morishita Group had an essential monopoly in Kabukicho. They sent customers they picked up at their free information centers to their affiliated cabaret clubs, adult entertainment establishments, hotels, video stores, ramen shops and other establishments.
“It’s a business model in which Morishita collects all the money spent on nightlife,” one insider says.
Their business acumen was also on full display in their “delivery health” (out-call) business. The revised Law Regulating Entertainment Businesses came into effect in 1999. The revision legalized off-premises adult entertainment establishments, but traditional online advertising was ineffective and not useful in attracting customers.
As a result, the group devised free information centers that exclusively advertised their affiliated and affiliated delivery health services. They made a killing from buildings with an information center on the first floor, a reception desk in the basement and a service room on the upper floors.
However, this type of delivery health business was considered a brick-and-mortar adult entertainment establishment. In 2006, Morishita was arrested for violating the adult-entertainment law.
A court later ordered Morishita to forfeit over 70 million yen in illegal proceeds, pay a fine of 500,000 yen and made him promise to make a “complete withdrawal” from Kabukicho’s sex industry.
Natural
Fast-forward two decades.
Insiders point to the beginning of the end being law enforcement’s recent crackdown on sex scouting group Natural, which is Japan’s largest.
With operations in the capital and the cities of Osaka, Nagoya, Sapporo and Kumamoto, Natural functions like an anonymous, mobile criminal group, or tokuryu. Its primary source of income comes from “scouting kickbacks,” in which they introduce women to adult entertainment establishments in exchange for a portion of their sales.
On January 26, police arrested the chairman of Natural, 40-year-old Hiroaki Obata, in Kagoshima Prefecture. It was law enforcement’s finishing touch in its ongoing crackdown, which included the expulsion of an officer for leaking information and other busts.
Two days later, Miyagi Prefectural Police raided soapland Marine Senhime in Sendai City’s Aoba Ward. It was alleged that the establishment had been employing women with large debts at host clubs.
The Marine Group officially advertised itself as “in-house recruiting without the use of scouts.” However, one industry source points out: “Police are currently focused on uncovering the funding sources of tokuryu groups like Natural. While the Marine Group ostensibly advertised its own recruitment, it’s possible that behind the scenes it had supply lines from these types of organizations. The raid on January 28 was likely not simply a crackdown on violations of the adult-entertainment law, but rather a forced investigation aimed at getting to the heart of organized crime.”
The building housing Marine Senhime, which is over 60 years old, was put up for sale for 300 million yen on January 30, the same day that the remaining soapland outlets in the group shuttered.
Pay the consequences
Certainly, the walls were closing in. In recent years, police had intensified its crackdown on the nightlife sector, particularly targeting malicious host clubs that manipulate young female clients into sex work to pay off exorbitant debts.
With law enforcement tightening enforcement of the anti-prostitution law, insiders believe the Morishita Group’s executives chose to burn down their empire and vanish rather than pay the worse consequences than they did in 2006.
Hakuho Building Co., Ltd. is a company founded in 1989 and headquartered in Tokyo. A core company of the Morishita Group, it operates DVD rental and multi-purpose cafes. It is also known for owning numerous properties in downtown areas like Shinjuku and Shibuya. Its business model was described as “from the cradle of night to the grave.”
And it worked. A recent balance sheet summary listed total assets at approximately 39.5 billion yen and retained earnings was around 25.8 billion yen.
As a result, there was a lot at stake.
“Morishita presumably owned properties through his own companies and other businesses, and formally assumed the position of landlord, renting them out to other businesses. This allowed him to claim, even if illegal activity occurred at the businesses, that he was merely renting them out, protecting his assets,” says an economic journalist.
However, the raid on January 28 signaled a shift in this balance. The police were no longer willing to listen to the “landlord” excuse.
But, asks Friday, where do we go from here?
The king of the entertainment district has lost his throne but the commercial sex business is not going anywhere. Indeed, turning a blind eye to the dark side in the name of righteous purification will not eliminate the underworld. Rather, it will only spread chaos whose true nature no one can grasp.
The billion-yen palace has lost its owner and is left in ruins, yes. But that’s not all, adds Friday, the receptacle for desire remains — along with a deeper, colder darkness that is about to spread across cities nationwide.
