The owner and employees of a jewelry store in Tokyo were arrested Friday on suspicion of selling accessories to women by falsely promising to turn them into models, police said.
Toshinori Matsumoto, 38, president of jewelry sales firm Atlantis, and his seven employees are suspected of selling accessories to some 470 people for a total 280 million yen mainly by offering fictitious model jobs at an outlet in Tokyo's Omote-sando district.
The suspects sold necklaces and other accessories to the women for around 1 million yen each although they were worth only 40,000 yen to 50,000 yen each, the police said.
They also pressured some of the women to buy accessories by ganging up on them for several hours.
With your current subscription plan you can comment on stories. However, before writing your first comment, please create a display name in the Profile section of your subscriber account page.