National / Crime & Legal Jan 7, 2020
The public safety commissions in six prefectures designated them Tuesday as “crime syndicates at war” in an effort to weaken them and stop their escalating battles.
National / Media | DARK SIDE OF THE RISING SUN Jan 4, 2020
The importance of defining organized crime in Japan
by Jake Adelstein
The definition of a crime is a critical part of law enforcement. After all, what constitutes a crime such as theft is fundamental to working out whether or not someone is ultimately guilty of committing the offense. With this in mind, the administration of Prime ...
World / Crime & Legal Dec 28, 2019
Uruguayan authorities have opened an investigation into a record cocaine seizure described as "the biggest blow to drug trafficking in the country's history," the navy said on Friday. The navy seized four soy flour containers packed with bags of cocaine at Montevideo's port. An inventory of ...
National / Crime & Legal Dec 4, 2019
Leader of Kobe Yamaguchi-gumi splinter group arrested over August shooting amid feud in syndicate
A leader of a splinter group of Japan's largest crime syndicate was arrested Tuesday for allegedly shooting a member of the parent group amid a gang feud in Kobe in August, police said. Hiroji Nakata is suspected of shooting a 51-year-old man affiliated with the ...
World / Politics Dec 1, 2019
Maltese leader Joseph Muscat to step down over case of slain reporter
Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat will step down on Jan. 18, party sources said on Saturday, following mounting criticism of his response to the murder of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia. The announcement came as the main suspect in the 2017 car bomb killing, tycoon Yorgen ...
World / Crime & Legal Nov 29, 2019
Maltese businessman accuses top government officials in murder case
A prominent Maltese businessman has offered to testify against top government officials over the 2017 murder of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia and said the prime minister has a conflict of interest in the case. Lawyers for the businessman, Yorgen Fenech, on Thursday deposited in court ...
National / Crime & Legal Nov 14, 2019
A group of 36 Japanese men have been detained in Manila over an alleged phone scam targeting people in Japan, Philippine immigration sources said Thursday. Based on information from Japanese investigative authorities, the immigration bureau detained the men at a hotel in Manila on Wednesday ...
World / Crime & Legal Nov 7, 2019
American family may have been 'bait' in Mexican cartel fight
The nine American women and children killed in northern Mexico were victims of a territorial dispute between an arm of the Sinaloa Cartel and a rival gang, officials said on Wednesday, and may have been used to lure one side into a firefight. Members of ...
National / Media | DARK SIDE OF THE RISING SUN Nov 2, 2019
It's illegal to pay gangs ... but that's not the point
by Jake Adelstein
A set of revised organized crime ordinances went into effect on Oct. 1 in Roppongi, Kabukicho, Shibuya and 26 other designated special districts in Tokyo. Under the law, any individual or group in these districts who pays protection money to anti-social forces — crime syndicates, ...
National Oct 31, 2019
Fine for poaching glass eels to be raised to ¥30 million in 2023, Fisheries Agency says
The Fisheries Agency plans to raise the maximum fine for illegal fishing of baby Japanese eels, or glass eels, from ¥100,000 to ¥30 million starting in 2023, in a bid to stem a source of funding of organized crime syndicates, agency sources said Wednesday. The ...
World / Crime & Legal Oct 20, 2019
In wake of drug cartel's street violence, Mexico and U.S. aim to freeze flow of guns from America
Mexico's foreign minister said on Saturday that President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and U.S. President Donald Trump had agreed to take swift action to stem the flow of illegal weapons from the United States into Mexico. Lopez Obrador told Trump on a phone call "I ...
National / Media | BIG IN JAPAN Sep 28, 2019
New generation of quasi-gangsters fly under police radar
by Mark Schreiber
Mainstream media last month broke a long-standing silence they've had concerning the activities of Japan's organized crime groups, which are referred to in official circles as "boryokudan" (violent groups) or, colloquially, as "yakuza." The Mainichi Shimbun (Sept. 15) reported that Kobe's Municipal Board of Education ...