Police ordered Japan's largest underworld organization, Yamaguchi-gumi, and Tokyo's Kokusui-kai syndicate to suspend the use of five of their offices in the wake of a series of shootings reported this week in Tokyo and neighboring areas, they said.

Police believe the shootings stemmed from the fatal shooting early Tuesday in Tokyo's Shibuya Ward of a gangster affiliated with Kokusui-kai, they said.

No injuries have been reported in the 16 shootings in Tokyo and the nearby prefectures of Kanagawa, Saitama, Chiba, Ibaraki and Tochigi since Wednesday, police said.

The Metropolitan Police Department issued an order to shut down Kokusui-kai's headquarters in Tokyo's Taito Ward and two other offices until June 18.

Kanagawa Prefectural Police issued an order to suspend use of a Yamaguchi-gumi office in Yokohama, and Saitama Prefectural Police took a similar action against an office affiliated with Kokusui-kai in the town of Miyashiro.

The National Police Agency said it is the first time police have issued such orders since the Antigang Law was introduced in March 1992.

The law allows prefectural public safety commissions to ban designated crime organizations from using their offices when the lives of local residents are threatened by gang war. The orders are valid for 15 days.

The latest shooting was reported early Friday in Tokyo's Meguro Ward.

Patrol officers heard gunshots around 1:20 a.m. Friday and found two bullet holes in the front door of an electric works company building in the Himonya district.

A member of a gang affiliated with Yamaguchi-gumi had worked for the company until last year, police said.

In another incident, several rounds were fired at a Kokusui-kai affiliate's office in the busy Ginza entertainment district of Tokyo's Chuo Ward at about 3:30 p.m. Thursday.

Police said on-duty officers at the scene arrested Hiroki Taguchi, a 32-year-old member of a Yamaguchi-gumi affiliate, on suspicion of firing the shots.

In another case, a company employee in Utsunomiya, Tochigi Prefecture, reported hearing a gunshot at around 12:20 a.m. Thursday. Police found bullet holes in the wall of the employee's home and in nearby areas.

Investigators said the gunman may have targeted the house by mistake, and the intended target may have been the house of a next-door neighbor who heads a Yamaguchi-gumi affiliate.

In another case, bullet marks were found on the steel door of a condominium in Tokyo's Ota Ward at about 12:35 a.m. Thursday. Four spent cartridges were recovered nearby. Until several years ago, a man with suspected links to Yamaguchi-gumi had lived in the condominium, police said.

Witnesses reported seeing a number of men leaving the site in two cars around the time of the shooting.

In another shooting, bullet holes were found Thursday in a Tokyo condominium believed to house the office of a Kokusui-kai affiliate in the Dogenzaka district of Shibuya Ward. Police said a neighbor reported hearing the shots at around 4 a.m. Thursday.

Details of some of the other shootings are as follows:

1) At about 1:30 p.m. Thursday, someone in a car fired three rounds at an office of a Kokusui-kai affiliate in Tokyo's Taito Ward, police said.

2) In Kanagawa Prefecture, police found bullet holes around midnight Thursday in the window of a vacant, first-floor room of a condominium and other nearby places in Takatsu Ward, Kawasaki. The chief of a Yamaguchi-gumi affiliate apparently lives in the building.

3) Around 10:25 p.m. Wednesday, spent cartridges were found in front of a Yamaguchi-gumi affiliate's office in Yokohama's Tsurumi Ward.

4) A resident of Ichihara, Chiba Prefecture, Thursday morning reported hearing three shots the previous night. Investigators found three bullet holes in the front glass door, inner wall and ceiling of an office of a Yamaguchi-gumi affiliate.

5) In the town of Miyashiro, Saitama Prefecture, three bullet holes were found Thursday afternoon in a glass window of a Kokusui-kai affiliate's office.