‘Dark Part-Time Job’ Robberies: Serious Threat That Shakes Japan’s Public Safety

Editorial

15:00 JST, October 19, 2024

It is a serious situation that threatens public safety in Japan. The police must do everything they can to uncover the whole picture regarding the criminal groups and bring them to justice.

There have been a series of robberies in which men break into suburban houses and other buildings and assault the residents, including elderly people. Since August, there have been around 20 such cases, mainly in Tokyo and Saitama, Chiba and Kanagawa prefectures.

In Yokohama, an elderly man was tied up and beaten all over his body. He died as a result. In Ichikawa, Chiba Prefecture, the home of an elderly woman was attacked. Her 50-year-old daughter, who lived with her, was kidnapped and confined in Saitama Prefecture.

These are extremely heinous crimes that target the homes of elderly people and destroy their peaceful daily lives in an instant. Citizens are living in great fear.

In recent years, a series of robberies by people engaged in “dark part-time jobs” have been reported across the country. The main culprit giving the orders in some of those cases was operating from overseas under the pseudonym “Luffy” and has been arrested. Nevertheless, similar incidents have been occurring frequently in the last two months. The police should work on the investigation as if their credibility is at stake.

The perpetrators were recruited through “dark part-time job” sites on social media and received orders for their crimes via communication apps. The culprits giving the orders used the same accounts for multiple incidents, under such names as “Koyama” and “Soseki Natsume.”

The police believe there is a strong possibility that this is a series of robberies committed by groups defined as “tokuryu,” or anonymous and fluid criminal groups whose members are connected via social media and repeatedly come together and disperse. Police from Tokyo and the prefectures involved have set up a joint investigation headquarters.

Similar robberies also occurred in Hokkaido this month. There is a risk that such cases will spread to a wider area, so strict vigilance is essential.

The common method used in the series of cases is to smash the windows of houses to get in. The heinousness of the criminals, who will stoop to any method to get money, is remarkable.

The physical perpetrators, recruited through dark part-time work sites, were threatened by the main culprits giving the orders who said they would kill them if they ran away. There is no denying the possibility that the crimes may escalate further in the future because of such fears on the part of the perpetrators.

In some cases, people claiming to be renovation workers or plumbers had visited houses in the areas around the crime scenes beforehand. The police are investigating, suspecting that the criminals were searching for houses to attack by spying on family structures and financial situations.

It is important not to respond to visits or phone calls from suspicious people. Those who experience any suspicious incidents should not hesitate to report them to the police.

Also, each family should strengthen crime prevention measures at its own home. Steps that should be considered include applying glass protection film to windows to make them harder to break or installing more than one lock on the front door and windows.

(From The Yomiuri Shimbun, Oct. 19, 2024)