OSAKA – Prosecutors on Wednesday sought a seven-year prison term for the former head of a school operator and his wife at the heart of a cronyism scandal linked to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, in relation to fraud valued at over ¥170 million ($1.6 million) involving public subsidies for their schools.
Yasunori Kagoike, the 66-year-old former chief of Moritomo Gakuen, and his 62-year-old wife Junko, are charged with defrauding the central government of roughly ¥56.4 million in subsidies between March 2016 and February 2017 by overcharging costs for constructing an elementary school in Osaka Prefecture on land purchased from the government, according to the indictment.
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