‘If it involves the Kouhei family…’ Umbrella gang leader arrested in last year’s incident in which two men were thrown to the ground

“No matter how small, we will catch him.”

A man came down the stairs of the police station building. When he noticed the press holding up cameras, he spoke to the police officer accompanying him with a quizzical look on his face. Then he turned his head again and looked firmly at the press.

On April 16, a suspect, Masatoshi Yonamine, 50, the head of the Yonamine clan under the Sumiyoshi-kai Kohei family, was arrested at the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department’s Nerima Police Station on suspicion of assault and sent to the public prosecutor’s office on the morning of April 17.

The suspect is suspected of assaulting two men, including throwing them to the ground, on a street in Nerima Ward, Tokyo, last year. According to the police, an acquaintance of the suspect got into a bill dispute at a snack bar, and the suspect, who was at a nearby restaurant, rushed to the scene and committed the crime against the man who owned the bar and the man who worked at the bar.

The Kohei family has close ties to Tokuryu (anonymous and fluid crime group), which engages in special fraud and black market robbery, and is also believed to be involved in “Natural,” the largest illegal sex scouting group in Japan. In addition to methamphetamine, he is believed to be involved in the trafficking of zombie cigarettes, which were ignited in Okinawa and have become a problem of abuse among young people, and is believed to be profiting enormously.

In January of this year, the Metropolitan Police Department launched a “Sumiyoshi-kai Kohei Family Special Task Force” under the leadership of the Chief of the Criminal Investigation Department. At a press conference held on that occasion, Toshihiko Oba, superintendent of the Metropolitan Police Department’s Anti-Boryokudan Division, said,

“We will arrest any and all crimes involving the Kohei family,” he said.

“We will arrest any and all crimes involving the Kohei family,” he said. True to his words, it appears that even unsolved cases from the past that may have been related to the Kohei family are being thoroughly investigated.

In March, five members of the Kouhei family, including the head of an organization affiliated with the Kouhei family, were arrested on suspicion of confinement and robbery, and on April 2, a member of the Kouhei family was arrested on extortion charges. Furthermore, on April 13, one of the gang members was arrested for importing 5 kilograms of methamphetamine (with a terminal value of 268 million yen) in ’24. The latest assault charge is also at least four months after the incident occurred. Crime journalist Taihei Ogawa asked.

He said, “This is definitely part of a concentrated crackdown on the Kouhei family. The police are showing a strong stance. For example, the Aichi Prefectural Police Department has been strengthening its crackdown on the Yamaguchigumi Kodokai since around 2009, establishing a special investigation headquarters for the Kodokai. Similarly, the Metropolitan Police Department is now focusing its investigative efforts on the Kohei family.

In the past, even if a case was reported, if it was a dispute between relatives or a matter that did not lead to prosecution, it would not have been made into a case. Now, however, we take whatever information we can get, and if there is an assault case there, we immediately take the person into custody. We are taking a very strict stance, not based on the criteria of whether or not we can prosecute. The arrestee this time is the head of a gang affiliated with the Kohei family, so there is plenty of appeal value for the Metropolitan Police Department. I think it means, ‘No matter how small, we will catch the Kouhei family, no matter whether they are at the bottom or at the top.

Yonamine denies the charges , saying, “I was just trying to break up a fight.

The suspect, Masatoshi Yonamine, denies the charge, saying that he only intervened[/caption].