Tokyo Police Arrest 7 Robbery Group Members

Tokyo, Jan. 26 (Jiji Press)--Tokyo police have arrested seven men believed to be members of a burglary group over an alleged robbery involving violence last October, which was possibly one of a series of burglaries across Japan since last year.

The Japanese capital's Metropolitan Police Department suspects that some of them followed instructions of individuals who call themselves "Luffy," "Mitsuhashi" and "Kimu" through the Telegram messaging app, which is said to be difficult to track, and got involved in the spate of burglaries.

The seven men in their 20s and 30s, including Kazuki Ishiguri, a 37-year-old construction worker from the northern Japan city of Sapporo, and Kentaro Oko, 33 and unemployed, who is from the city of Fujiidera, Osaka Prefecture, western Japan, face charges including robbery resulting in injury.

The seven robbers allegedly broke into a house in the suburban Tokyo city of Inagi around 4 p.m. of Oct. 20, 2022, pretending to be delivery workers.

They tied the wrists of three residents with adhesive tape, assaulted them and robbed them of some 35 million yen in cash and about 140 items, including gold bars, worth approximately 8.6 million yen. In police questioning, two of them have admitted to the charges while the other five have denied the allegations or remained silent.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]