The chief of the Shiga prefectural fisheries federation and seven other people were arrested Wednesday for allegedly trying to extort money from a public works contractor.
Yoshikazu Kawamori, 68, head of the Federation of Shiga Fisheries Cooperatives, and the seven others used a fraudulent claim in a bid to extort money in March 2001 from the contractor, which was working on a road-bypass project near Lake Biwa, prefectural police said.
Kawamori and his accomplices claimed that the work polluted a river and lowered the fish catch, which was not the case, according to police.