YAMANASHI (TR) – Two men arrested for stealing cash from a hot spring facility in Yamanashi Prefecture have confessed to carrying out up to 400 similar thefts using homemade duplicate keys, police have revealed, reports TV Yamanashi (Aug. 14).
Junichi Umeda, 70, and Osamu Kobayashi, 63, were arrested and indicted for theft after allegedly using a forged key to open a changing room locker at an onsen in Fujikawa Town this past June, making off with 20,000 yen in cash.
The duo’s modus operandi was remarkably elaborate. According to police, the men would enter the hot spring as regular customers and sneak a locker key out to their vehicle. There, they would create a makeshift mold using silicone and a cylindrical tube. Using a gas burner, they would melt metal and pour it directly into the mold to cast a functional duplicate key on the spot.
On August 14, police displayed a massive haul of confiscated evidence seized from the suspects. The collection totaled around 300 items, including 263 forged keys, gas burners and casting silicone.
“We repeated the crime 300 to 400 times,” Umeda reportedly told investigators.
Police believe the pair has been systematically targeting hot spring facilities across Yamanashi, Kanagawa, and Shizuoka prefectures for the past two to three years. During their most prolific months, the duo pocketed hundreds of thousands of yen.
Police plan to refer the additional charges to prosecutors next week. Authorities are urging anyone who suspects they may have had cash stolen from a locker to contact the Kajikazawa Police Station.
