Mob Big in Japan - Washington Post

[jla]

jla, welcome to FG and thank you for sharing your incredible story with the WaPo. Do you plan to continue to live/work in Japan?

I plan to come back. My son has his 4th birthday coming up and I want to be home for that. Well, not home exactly but with the family. I have as much right to be here as anyone else. I'm not the first journalist to piss off the yakuza here. Mizoguchi Atsushi wrote some very good stuff about the Yamaken-gumi and their thugs stabbed his son in 2006--because they couldn't Mizoguchi Senior. A good friend, Suzuki, who's written GOKUDO NO URACHISHIKI had his face pounded in four or five years back for daring to make fun of Yamaguchi-gumi street-fighting skills. They both still work as journalists here--they're just a little more careful

[jla]

I'm not saying your life is fictional and if Marvin vouches for you that's not only okay, but that's heavy with me.

I am still in doubt about the information you received identifying Goto. I have no way to verify that and probably your are at the mercy of your source/sources also.

I do know of a story that involved Jim Moynihan and the need for a liver transplant. Goto was not the oyabun in question. My agency at that time was also approached to facilitate this operation in the US and I was advised on its status of Jim's ops interest. BTW, you may possibly know Jim is retired and working back in Japan. I will be seeing him in a few days and see what I can post back on this, if it is of interest.

It is not beyond the world that elvolves around the Yaks and J-society to have mis-information delt out.

Could there have been the need for two such transplant operations? Your guess is as good as mine.

I don't know if this answers your question but maybe this well help. The hospital/surgeon that operated on Goto did operations for at least three yakuza in total including Goto. Inagawa Yuko, the leader of the Inagawa-kai was scheduled for a liver transplant in the United States after Goto, but because Goto broke his promise--he suffered the consequences. He ended up getting a liver transplant in Australia that was not successful and died in 2002.
I don't doubt what you're saying. I know Jim. He's a great guy. A lot of people in the bureau say he screwed up the deal--I don't think so. It was a good idea but not executed as well as it could have been done.
I'm not going to go into the moral/ethical issues of who gets priority for a liver transplant. I don't think that the FBI set it up--they got him the visa.

I'm interested in your story--write me at jla.japan@gmail.com. Give my best to Jim. I know he can't have been happy to have the story out but it was publish or perish. A higher profile means that people are more likely to notice when/if you vanish. I'm hoping that a few people in the Yamaguchi-gumi find it unpleasant that one of their top executives ratted them out.

[jla]

jla, I apologize for the above remark, and wish you and your book do well.

Thank you. No apologies really needed. It's a crazy story; I understand that. I got treated like a crackpot by one publication that looked at my article. The Washington Post spent a long time checking the details and vetting the story. They confirmed it with their own sources. The Yomiuri would have done the same. You get cut a little slack when you're a reporter employed by the newspaper, but when you're an outsider--things are different. John and Emily at the Post were very patient and helpful.

[jla]

[quote="Catoneinutica"]Takechan takes a lot of heat, but he seems to be pretty well-informed about the Mob, and willing to discuss it]
Yes, Takechan is impressive. I think the link between Goto and Sokka Gakkai are well-established. They are discussed passingly in a NPA report on Goto-gumi and it's history (1999). Sokka Gakkai is mentioned by name. There is also allegedly a letter Goto wrote to the head of Sokka Gakkai posted on the internet. I can't verify it.
Goto has been witnessed dining with members of Komeito, the political party of Sokka Gakkai. When you have Diet members possibly working for you, i say possible because having dinner with a member of Komeito doesn't establish a clear connection, and I'm also aware that Sokka Gakkai's lawyers are ferocious--but if you were a yakuza with some politicians in your pocket and a religious organization backing you--it could certainly make you very powerful.

[jla]

Though it seems the matter has already been cleared, I'll vouch for Jake 100%.
He was my inspiration for joining the media in the first place. I worked briefly for the Yomiuri and aspired, like Jake, to cover stories for the Japanese media (My ignominous stay at the Yom ended when I was effectively sacked after a few weeks of inept checking of the Engrish on the Daily Yomiuri).
Jake is widely esteemed within the Japanese media and others have confirmed his story's veracity for me.
He's a top-class journalist. And, on the one occasion I managed to talk to him briefly, seemed to be a fine person as well.

That was a very nice thing to say, thank you. I hope I was a positive inspiration. Well, maybe I was a fine person when I met you. I don't know about these days. Here's what I really dislike about Goto--he not only takes out his target but he attacks the friend of his target at well. He basically forces you to cut off your ties with people you care about and isolates you.
One of the reasons it took so damn long to get that article published is first I had to make sure the people close to me were somewhere safe. It took time. Along the way, I've had to make some unpleasant moral compromises.
Definitely things I'm not going to put in a book. As a human being, I have some serious moral flaws but there's one thing I've tried to do is not burn my sources. You're supposed to protect them like your own family. I've never had to choose between burning a source and possibly putting someone in serious danger. It's not an easy decision to make. I failed one source in my career and it was a horrible failure. Personally, I blame Goto for what I think happened. Even if he didn't give the order, it was his outfit. I can safely say, we really hate each other.

I checked out your site, some great stuff. You have a video of the akasen thing. I think that was right before the anti-prostitution laws (売春防止法） went into effect. In many ways, they were Japan's first anti-human trafficking laws. The bizarre thing about the anti-prostitution laws, is that except under special circumstances, the prositute and the customer can't be arrested. It's only the pimp or the brothel owner. The law was designed to protect Japanese women who had been sold into sexual slavery. It was also designed so that all the men (including diet members) frequenting the sex shops could go on doing it with impunity.

Good luck pursuing your career in journalism. My experience with it has been rewarding. The reality is 99% of what you do as a journalist is worthless--you're just feeding news junkies, or people's morbid curiousity. However, there's that 1% in which you right a wrong, or maybe point out a serious problem, or do something that makes the society you're living in a better place. It's the 1% that makes it all worth it. I know, kind of a smarmy thing to say but it's true. Isn't that whole Buddhist "right livelihood" deal?
I'm a lousy Buddhist, by the way.

[Takechanpoo]

[quote="Catoneinutica"]
Takechan takes a lot of heat, but he seems to be pretty well-informed about the Mob, and willing to discuss it]
Originally Goto-gumi was just a rural small yakuza based in Fujinomiya, Shizuoka. Why have such a rural small yakuza been a one of powerful yakuzas among not only Yamaguchi-gumi but also the whole yakuzas? Goto-gumi bulit its economic foundation by drugs. They produced those drugs by using that motorious Asahara's Aum Shinri kyo in "7th satyam" Although officially "7th satyam" is regarded as a plant to produce sarin, it is a LIE. In reality Aum produced drugs in "7th satyam". And Soka made J-police and J-medias reporte "7th satyam" as a sarin producing plant. This information is still a taboo in this society. Remember that.

[Catoneinutica]

Greji's buddy Moynihan seems to be the buffoon who arranged the Goto fiasco:


"James Moynihan, the FBI's man in Tokyo who brokered the deal, said: "You can't monitor the
activities of the yakuza in the US if you don't know who they are. Goto only gave us a fraction of what he promised, but it was better than nothing." Mr Moynihan has since been replaced."

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/fbi-helped-japanese-gangster-to-have-lifesaving-transplant-in-us-837427.html

I'd say Goto's surgeon, Dr. Ronald W. Busuttil, who made follow-up house calls to Goto in Japan, sometimes while Goto was in J-prison, was the recipient of some serious omiyage. Time for an IRS audit.

-catone

-reading the LA Times readers' comments, you can see that dozens of people are opting out of the organ donor program. Damn shame.

-one commentator noted that Asians seem to have unusually high rates of Hepatitis. Anyone know why that is?

[Takechanpoo]

one commentator noted that Asians seem to have unusually high rates of Hepatitis. Anyone know why that is?

In the case of yakuza, they infect it by tatoo needle.
occupational desease for them

[Mike Oxlong]

In the case of yakuza, they infect it by tatoo needle.
occupational desease for them

I understood from Greji that "occupational disease" was what they called the rash the victorious troops seem to always come down with mere days after "raising the flag".

[Dragonette]

one commentator noted that Asians seem to have unusually high rates of Hepatitis. Anyone know why that is?

What Take-chan says about irezumi may very well be true, but to be passed around it has to be present in the first place:

http://www.cumc.columbia.edu/dept/gi/hepB.html "Hepatitis A and hepatitis B infections are prevalent throughout Asia. ....It is also transmitted vertically from mother to infant in the perinatal period which is a major mode of transmission in regions where hepatitis B is endemic."

I have a close friend who was born in Hong Kong and came here when he was about 10 years old. Although he has no symptoms, when his mom died of hepatitis B in her late sixties, he discovered that in many parts of Asia hepatitis B has been passed on from mother to child for many generations and he is infected, too. It's a very slow and silent killer, so was unnoticed in times past when people didn't often live into their sixties.

I've been after him for years to get treatment, but because of exaggerated tales of side effects, etc., and the fact that he feels fine now, he hasn't so far done anything about it.

[Visitor K]

here in rural mexico, hepatitis is everywhere, but its considered a childhood disease like chicken pox back in the states.. i guess they say that if you get it in childhood, it is not as bad. i have no idea if thats true, as the locals down here also think that coca cola is the world's best medicine (no shitting! they say to take it for colds and flu!).
there are a whole lot of different types and causes for hepatitis, hep c is supposedly the worst one, and although a virus that never leaves your system, hep a can be lived with quite normally and does not become a chronic condition (just cant drink so much alcohol)..
for some reason, although there are vaccinations to keep people immune to A and B, nobody uses them down here.. no idea why.

[Iraira]

Ok, kids...Hep C lecture time

Chronic infection: 75%-85% of infected persons
Cirrhosis: 20% of chronically infected persons
Deaths from chronic liver disease: 1%-5% of infected persons may die
Leading indication for liver transplant
There is no vaccine to prevent hepatitis C.
Interferon and ribavirin are two drugs licensed for the treatment of persons with chronic hepatitis C.
Combination therapy, using pegylated interferon and ribavirin, is currently the treatment of choice.
Combination therapy can get rid of the virus in about 5 out of 10 persons for genotype 1 and in up to 8 out of 10 persons for genotype 2 and 3.
The risk for perinatal HCV transmission is about 4%.
If coinfected with HIV, the risk for perinatal infection is about 19%.

http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/diseases/hepatitis/c/

[Mulboyne]

[pheyton]

[Kuang_Grade]

[Greji]

This bears repeating.

Also, what ever happened to Mr. Adelstein?

Ahh, you are giving credence to a review of an article from the Shukan Jitsuwa? Does the name Wai Wai ring any bells....

[Catoneinutica]

Steve Jobs is taking a lot of heat from some quarters for queue-jumping for his liver transplant in Tennessee. Someone ought to point out the infinitely more egregious case of Goto.

Greji's buddy Moynihan seems to be the buffoon who arranged the Goto fiasco:


"James Moynihan, the FBI's man in Tokyo who brokered the deal, said: "You can't monitor the
activities of the yakuza in the US if you don't know who they are. Goto only gave us a fraction of what he promised, but it was better than nothing." Mr Moynihan has since been replaced."

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/fbi-helped-japanese-gangster-to-have-lifesaving-transplant-in-us-837427.html

I'd say Goto's surgeon, Dr. Ronald W. Busuttil, who made follow-up house calls to Goto in Japan, sometimes while Goto was in J-prison, was the recipient of some serious omiyage. Time for an IRS audit.

-catone

-reading the LA Times readers' comments, you can see that dozens of people are opting out of the organ donor program. Damn shame.

-one commentator noted that Asians seem to have unusually high rates of Hepatitis. Anyone know why that is?

[Takechanpoo]

full movie of Goto Tadamasa's birth day party (1998 ) in his Fujinomiya's palace.
[YT]98XpedYMY0g[/YT]
part2
part3
part4
part5

[Greji]

full movie of Goto Tadamasa's birth day party (1998 ) in his Fujinomiya's palace.

Take, you really seem hung up on Goto oyabu. Is he fucking you, or are you fucking him?

[Acidas]

Originally Goto-gumi was just a rural small yakuza based in Fujinomiya, Shizuoka. Why have such a rural small yakuza been a one of powerful yakuzas among not only Yamaguchi-gumi but also the whole yakuzas? Goto-gumi bulit its economic foundation by drugs. They produced those drugs by using that motorious Asahara's Aum Shinri kyo in "7th satyam" Although officially "7th satyam" is regarded as a plant to produce sarin, it is a LIE. In reality Aum produced drugs in "7th satyam". And Soka made J-police and J-medias reporte "7th satyam" as a sarin producing plant. This information is still a taboo in this society. Remember that.

Yakuza made its money from drugs? wow, what a surprise

actually; Goto's main focus was real estate and also basically "owning" most of the geinokai (yes; with their close connections to Soka); and a spearhead of Yamaguchi Gumi's invasion of Tokyo (in those days); for a while they (together with Yamaken) had the reputation of the most vicious of the Yamaguchi Gumi

[Takechanpoo]

[YT]jTXGmHPYcy0[/YT]
Tsukasa Shinobu(Shinoda Kenichi), 6th boss of Yamaguchi-gumi, who is now imprisoned in Fuchu, sings a song.

[Takechanpoo]

Released cerebration gathering. He is not an actor but a young yakuza of Sumiyoshi-kai. a man to the core!

[YT]_LjDJ11uqS4[/YT]

[Mike Oxlong]

[davai-davai IV]

[2triky]