Prosecutors arrested two people Thursday on suspicion of distributing advertisements using a postal discount for disabled people, prosecution officials said.
Toshiyo Uda, 53, president of an Osaka advertising agency, and Toru Abe, 55, one of his former executives, are suspected of evading about ¥600 million in postal fees by using the discount for disabled people around 2006 and 2007, they said.
The suspects used the discount to send out mail-order ads on behalf of Wellco Corp., a printing and mail-order house in Ishikawa Prefecture, at a rate of ¥8 per item instead of ¥120, they said.
The two are also suspected of evading about ¥80 million in corporate taxes in connection with abusing the discount, the sources said.
Printed materials enclosed in the ad mail claimed they were published by an organization for the disabled. The materials, however, were printed at Uda's ad agency, Shinsei Kigyo, they said.
The suspects allegedly persuaded groups representing disabled people in Osaka and Hyogo prefectures to let them use their names as the publishers of the printed materials to use the discount.
They marketed the ads to several clients and apparently sent about 100 million items in all, evading more than ¥10 billion in postal fees, the sources said.
