Television Tokyo Channel 12 Ltd. employees paid 350,000 yen to an informant who told them about a planned heist at a Tokyo company that the broadcaster filmed and aired in May, it was acknowledged Tuesday.

According to police, five men broke into the construction materials company in Edogawa Ward at around 1:40 a.m. May 25 and tried to steal a safe.

A six- or seven-member TV Tokyo crew filmed the entire incident, from the break-in to the arrest of some of the perpetrators by police who had been alerted.