Tag - organized-crime

 
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October 19, 2025
 

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ORGANIZED CRIME

Suspect Qian Ling (center), who is believed to be the group's leader, following his re-arrest, in Tokyo's Koto Ward on Thursday.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 17, 2025
Tokyo police arrest phone scam group leader
The Metropolitan Police Department suspects that the group was behind at least some 500 phone scam cases committed in half a year through January.
Motorists ride past the Prince International Plaza in Phnom Penh on Wednesday. U.S. authorities on Tuesday unsealed an indictment against Chen Zhi, a British-Cambodian businessperson who owns Prince Group and who is accused of running forced labor camps in Cambodia.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Oct 16, 2025
U.S. and U.K. sanctions target Cambodia's Prince Group and tycoon Chen Zhi
Prince Holding Group, one of Cambodia's largest conglomerates, was a front for "one of Asia's largest transnational criminal organizations," the U.S. Department of Justice said.
Ferries cross the Mekong River in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on Oct. 8. U.S. prosecutors have charged Chen Zhi, the chairman of Phnom Penh-based Prince Group, with engaging in a wire-fraud conspiracy and operating a money-laundering scheme.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Oct 15, 2025
U.S. seizes $15B in bitcoin and charges Cambodian mogul with cyberfraud
Prince Group Chairman Chen Zhi, who was born in China but emigrated to Cambodia, is not in custody and remains at large.
Alleged victims of Myanmar's scam centers in the process of repatriation on Feb. 12. Fraud factories in Myanmar blamed for scamming Chinese and American victims out of billions of dollars are still in business and bigger than ever.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Oct 14, 2025
Myanmar scam cities booming despite crackdown — using Musk's Starlink
China, Thailand and Myanmar had pressured militias into vowing to "eradicate" the compounds in February, releasing around 7,000 people from a brutal call center-like system.
Ana and Maria, (not their real names), victims of sex trafficking from Latin America, clean dishes in Tirane on Aug. 1.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Oct 7, 2025
'I found hell': the women ensnared in Albania's global sex trade
Empowered by the global reach of cybercrime, criminal networks are using Albania as a transit point to exploit women from other nations around the world.
National Police Agency Commissioner-General Yoshinobu Kusunoki (right) hands a letter of appointment to Akira Uno, head of the agency's newly created information analysis office, at the agency in Tokyo on Wednesday.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Oct 1, 2025
Police in Japan launch teams to combat tokuryū crime groups
Members of the groups are connected through social media for illegal activities such as fraud and robbery.
A street in Naha in August. In entertainment districts in southern Okinawa, a drug known as "laughing gas vape" is being abused at nightclubs and bar. Now, some establishments have put up warning notices.
JAPAN / Regional Voices: Okinawa
Sep 22, 2025
Abuse of 'zombie cigarettes' among Okinawa youths raises alarm
"Laughing gas vape," inhaled using devices resembling e-cigarettes, can cause its users to lose control.
Yasuhiro Tsuyuki, former commissioner-general of Japan's National Police Agency, speaks during an interview on Aug. 12 in Tokyo.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Sep 21, 2025
Ex-police chief pins hopes on new 'tokuryū' measures
Conventional methods do not work against such groups because they recruit using encrypted social media apps, making it difficult to identify the ringleaders.
ChatGPT owner OpenAI says it "actively works to identify and disrupt scam-related misuse of ChatGPT.”
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Sep 19, 2025
ChatGPT was used ‘to help scammers do their thing’ at Asia fraud compound
Scammers used the artificial intelligence tool to craft convincing messages designed to trick people into parting with their money.
Akira Sanbonchiku (second from left), a member of the "JP Dragon" crime ring, is transported from the Philippines to Narita Airport in Chiba Prefecture on Wednesday.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Sep 11, 2025
Six 'JP Dragon' crime ring members arrested after extradition from Philippines
Police believe the six have defrauded at least 250 people in 20 Japanese prefectures out of approximately ¥900 million since around October 2019.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to reporters alongside Secretary of State Marco Rubio in June.
WORLD / Politics
Sep 7, 2025
U.S. strike on alleged cartel boat shows Rubio’s influence growing
The attack was the culmination of Trump’s yearslong interest in using unprecedented — and legally questionable — force against drug cartels.
Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. walks to the ring for his fight against Jake Paul in Anaheim, California, on June 28.
MORE SPORTS
Aug 25, 2025
Boxer Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. released from prison pending trial
U.S. authorities arrested Chavez in July for being in the United States illegally.
Signs for fast-fashion factories in Prato, Italy, on Friday. Chinese crime groups in the district thrive on the "Prato system" rife with corruption in the fast-fashion sector.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Aug 4, 2025
Italy's fast fashion hub becomes Chinese mafia battlefield
Gangs are battling to control Prato's production of clothes hangers — a market estimated to be worth €100 million ($115 million) — and the bigger prize of transporting apparel.
The Tokyo District Court on Tuesday sentenced Tomohiro Koyama, who is believed to be the third-highest-ranking member of the "JP Dragon" crime ring, to three years and six months in prison for fraud.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Jul 29, 2025
Senior 'JP Dragon' crime ring member jailed for 42 months
Tomohiro Koyama, 51, is believed to be the third-highest-ranking member of the ring comprising Japanese nationals.
Buildings inside the Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone along the Mekong river in the Bokeo province of Laos on May 26.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Jul 15, 2025
'Las Vegas in Laos': the riverside city awash with crime
With the initial aim of attracting tourists with casinos and resorts, the Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone quickly became a center for money laundering and trafficking.
A video by the National Police Agency warns about fake scams.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Jul 8, 2025
Scams involving police impersonation surge
Victims lost over ¥30 billion to such fraud cases in the first five months of 2025.
ASIA PACIFIC
Jun 25, 2025
Foreigners rescued from scam centers still stuck along Thai-Myanmar border
The Karen National Army, a rebel group, said it was currently housing 216 people, including citizens of Vietnam, China, the Philippines, and Indonesia.
The International Border Checkpoint of Poipet, Banteay Meanchey province, Cambodia
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jun 24, 2025
Thailand targets Cambodian scam centers amid border dispute
As part of the crackdown, Thailand will ban foreign tourists from crossing over to Cambodia and curb air travel to Siem Reap for gambling purposes, Paetongtarn said.
A police car in Manila. Philippines authorities have detained the suspected leader of the "JP Dragon" crime ring based in the Southeast Asian country.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Jun 6, 2025
Philippines detains leader of 'JP Dragon' crime ring
The criminal organization, which includes former Japanese gang members, allegedly worked with another Philippines-based fraud group led by a suspect known as "Luffy."
Authorities in northwestern Cambodia have detained around 50 foreign nationals, including more than 20 Japanese, in a raid targeting online gambling and fraud operations in Poipet.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
May 29, 2025
Over 20 Japanese reportedly detained in Cambodia in online scam raid
Cambodian investigative authorities conducted a search following a tip-off alleging the presence of Japanese nationals involved in fraud.
Why I chose Japanese citizenship over permanent residency
Jon Heese (second left) takes part in a 2024 New Year's nihonshu barrel opening ceremony.
Tokyo ordered to pay damages to South Asian woman over police response
The Tokyo High Court held that, “even taking the woman’s consent into account” for sharing her personal information, the officers breached their duty of care and acted unlawfully.
Former PM Tomiichi Murayama dies at age 101
Former Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama speaks during an interview in Tokyo in March 2007.
Japan's fractured politics could ensnarl Takaichi's economic plans
Sanae Takaichi, the newly elected leader of Japan's ruling party, the Liberal Democratic Party, attends a news conference after the LDP presidential election in Tokyo on Oct. 4.
Tokyo's best Sunday roasts and all their trimmings
Swan & Lion's Sunday roast, which is drenched in a red wine gravy, is part of a three-course meal.
What does Jimbocho think of its unexpected ‘cool’ status?
Tokyo's Jimbocho neighborhood is a haven for book lovers, its rows of secondhand bookstores spilling over with printed materials.
What you need to see at this year's Tokyo film festival
Chloe Zhao’s "Hamnet"
New film explores how Japan and the U.S. found common ground through baseball
Masanori Murakami became the first MLB player from Japan when he made his debut with the Giants on Sept 1, 1964.
As they wrestle for power, Japan’s political parties must remember their base
Rengo's head Tomoko Yoshino speaks to reporters in Tokyo on Oct. 8.
Sumo is about to hit London and the West with a force previously unseen
Preparations advance on Monday for the Grand Sumo Tournament at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

Rock group The Yellow Monkey played K-Arena Yokohama in June as part of a nationwide tour. Concerts are increasingly popular in the age of social media as users value in-person experiences.
Inside Japan’s arena boom: Sports, sound and city-building
By Patrick St. Michel

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