A 51-year-old prosecutor at the Nagoya High Public Prosecutor's Office has admitted shoplifting books and liquor worth 30,000 yen, officials said Friday.
The Justice Ministry decided to cut 10 percent of his salary for one month, while the Nagoya District Public Prosecutor's Office launched an investigation into the case, they said.
The prosecutor, whose name was withheld, will resign today, they said.
According to the prosecutors' office, the man was caught by a bookstore clerk as he attempted to leave the shop with an electronic notebook and a book he had not paid for on the evening of June 5.
He admitted to the clerk that he intended to steal the items. He also confessed that he had stolen liquor and food from a nearby department store, they said.
Because the prosecutor was repentant, returning some merchandise and buying other items, both the bookstore and the department store did not report the thefts to police, according to the prosecutors' office.
Sources close to the prosecutor said he had been mentally unbalanced recently due to the "health problems of a family member."
He was appointed a prosecutor in 1973. He served at prosecutors' offices mainly in western Japan and took the post at the Nagoya office last July.