Japan robberies ringleader allegedly gave orders from Manila immigration facility via app
- Justice Secretary said the man was arrested in the Philippines in 2021 on other charges and is being held at the immigration facility with three other suspects
- Police suspect a man in Japan was also in the gang after a person charged with robbery said he met an individual employing the Luffy username in Tokyo
The alleged ringleader of a string of robberies across Japan, known to have gone by the name of “Luffy,” is believed to have remotely given instructions to those carrying out the break-ins via an encrypted messaging app from an immigration facility in Manila, where he is being held.
Philippine Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla said the man was arrested in the Philippines in 2021 and is being held at the immigration facility, along with another Japanese national suspected of being part of the robbery group.
Remulla said the second man will be deported to Japan as soon as the necessary paperwork is completed, but Luffy is facing other, unrelated criminal charges in the Philippines with the case pending in a Manila court, preventing his immediate deportation to Japan.
According to the minister, Luffy was arrested by Philippine authorities in May 2021. He faced deportation the same month as a fugitive of justice and was allegedly using counterfeit documents.
He is now facing separate charges in the Philippines and will be deported if the case is dismissed, or once he has served time if he is found guilty of the alleged crimes.
The other Japanese male has been detained at the immigration facility since 2019. After being apprehended by Philippine immigration at Manila’s international airport in 2019, he faced a deportation order the following year for being a fugitive in Japan for theft.
He also faced a separate criminal charge in the Philippines, but immigration authorities said he can now be deported because the criminal case against him was dropped at a local court on Wednesday.
Japan arrests 8 men over spate of robberies with an alleged Philippines link
The robberies began last year and appear to have been carried out by people who were instructed by ringleaders through the encrypted messaging app Telegram.
Among the cases is the murder-robbery of 90-year-old Kinuyo Oshio in her home in the city of Komae in Tokyo on January 19. The incident struck a nerve in Japan, a country known for low crime rates and safety relative to other countries.
Analysis of phones belonging to some of those arrested in connection with the robberies shows they received instructions from three names – Luffy, Kim and Mitsuhashi. A telephone number linked to one Luffy suggested that person was in the Philippines, according to Japanese police.
However, police suspect that a man in Japan also employed the Luffy online username to organise a string of robberies in the country, in addition to the alleged ringleader who is currently detained in the Philippines, sources close to the matter said on Saturday.
The possibility surfaced after a man who has been charged over an attempted robbery in Yamaguchi Prefecture, western Japan, last November said he had met an individual employing the Luffy username in Tokyo and received instructions regarding how to commit the crime, the sources said.
They met after the four Japanese men suspected of being behind the robberies were detained at an immigration facility in Manila.
According to the sources, the indicted man applied for an illegal part-time job via the Twitter direct message service to collect cash from victims of fraud, the sources said.
He was then instructed to install the Telegram encrypted messaging app on his smartphone and meet a person employing Luffy as a username at Kumegawa Station on the Seibu Shinjuku Line in Higashimurayama, western Tokyo.
The individual he met, who spoke with a Kansai accent and appeared to be in his 30s or 40s, provided simple instructions and handed over some cash.
After receiving the instructions, the man rented a car in Okayama Prefecture and acted as a driver in the attempted robbery in Iwakuni, Yamaguchi Prefecture. He picked up an accomplice on the way and was provided with further instructions at the scene of the crime via the Telegram app.
Japanese police have requested that the four men in Manila be transferred to Japan, after obtaining arrest warrants for fraud. The police plan to investigate the possible involvement of the four men in the spate of robberies since last year.
According to Philippine Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla, the warden of the Manila immigration facility has been instructed to confiscate all communication devices at the facility and ensure that access to them is strictly monitored.
Japan’s National Police Agency said there have been at least 20 cases of theft and robbery in 14 prefectures since last year.
