TOKYO (TR) – Tokyo Metropolitan Police have arrested a former talent agency representative director for sexually assaulting a female underling three years ago, reports Nippon News Network (Jan. 16).
Sources in the entertainment industry say that Takuma Yamanaka, 39, faked his background in order to work in showbiz.
On two occasions in August 2023, Yamanaka is suspected of sexually assaulting a woman in her 20s, who was then on the roster of the agency, at the agency and an accommodation facility in Kasukabe City, Saitama Prefecture.
Upon his arrest on suspicion of sexual assault, Yamanaka reportedly denied the charges, saying, “The allegations are true, but I did not coerce [the woman].”
Yamanaka is believed to have exploited his position as agency director to take the woman to the accommodation facility under the pretense of a “walk,” and committed the crimes when they were alone.
Johnny & Associates
A person in the entertainment industry who knows Yamanaka well tells the site for weekly tabloid Josei Jishin that the suspect has faked his background for years.
“Yamanaka has been telling people around him that he is a former member of [talent agency Johnny & Associates],” the insider says. “He claims he was affiliated with [the agency] for eight years, from the age of 12 to 20, and served as a Johnny’s Jr. member, working as a backup dancer for V6 and KinKi Kids [now DOMOTO].”
The source says Yamanaka has also previously given media interviews in which he said he was in the same class as singer Kazuya Kamenashi and that he was supposed to debut as a member of NEWS.
“However, when some media outlets interviewed SMILE-UP. Inc. [the successor to Johnny & |Associates], they discovered that Yamanaka had no prior affiliation with the agency,” the sources says.
The sources goes on to say that Yamanaka used faked background to skillfully court women aspiring to a career in the entertainment industry.
“Yamanaka, who founded an entertainment agency in 2014, would ‘scout’ women through social media and streaming apps,” the source says. According to women who met him after being approached, at first they felt they couldn’t trust him at all. After all, he is a fat middle-aged man, and looked nothing like a talent from Johnny & Associates.”
However, he recounted strangely realistic anecdotes from his time in the industry. “So, they gradually began to believe him,” the source says.
