Ex-Japan NPO Exec, 2 Others Arrested over Organ Transplant Abroad

Tokyo, July 7 (Jiji Press)--Japanese police arrested three people Tuesday, including a former executive of a now-defunct nonprofit organization that supported patients of incurable diseases, on suspicion of illegally brokering an overseas organ transplant case for fees.

The three were arrested by a joint investigation team of Tokyo's Metropolitan Police Department and the police departments of Aichi Prefecture, central Japan, and the western prefecture of Hyogo for suspected violations of Japan's organ transplant law.

It was the first time for Japanese police to take action against suspected organ transplant mediation for fees, according to the MPD. The investigation team did not disclose whether the suspects admitted to the allegations against them.

The former NPO official, Hiromichi Kikuchi, 66, a resident of Yokohama, the capital of Kanagawa Prefecture, south of Tokyo, was arrested by the MPD in 2023 on suspicion of mediating an organ transplant case abroad without permission in 2022 when he was serving in the organization post. He is believed to have engaged in the latest paid mediation case while out on bail.

Kikuchi was later sentenced to eight months in jail over the 2022 case and has been serving his sentence since January this year. The NPO was dissolved the same month.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]