A 73-year-old man is being held for allegedly violating the law banning the solicitation of child sex by performing lewd acts on a 17-year-old girl in June, Kanagawa Prefectural Police said Wednesday.
Umekichi Utsuki, a resident of Yokohama's Izumi Ward, is suspected of stopping the girl and paying her 70,000 yen in front of JR Yokohama Station on June 19. The police allege he then took the girl to his house where he performed lewd acts on her.
"I was lonely living by myself," Utsuki, a pensioner, was quoted as telling the police. "She went home with me when I asked her to."
The girl is unemployed and a resident of Kanazawa Ward, also in Yokohama.