Vietnamese gang suspected of organized theft arrested in Japan

Two Vietnamese men who ran the venues, Vu Van Khang, 26, and Nguyen Huu Tu, 29, were arrested for allegedly breaking organized crime laws, Asahi Shimbun reported.

The locations attacked included a former Vietnamese restaurant, a house and a company office where the stolen goods were stored, Sleeves reported.

Japanese investigators initially suspected that criminal organizations linked Vietnamese inside and outside Japan to organized shoplifting operations targeting pharmacies and other stores in Japan before the goods were exported to Vietnam.

Around 700 items were seized during the raids on the premises, their monetary value yet to be confirmed.

Police said there may be more than 10 locations in Japan where the stolen goods are being stored.

1,119 thefts of goods worth at least 100,000 yen ($660) took place in pharmacies last year, according to Japan’s National Police Agency. In such cases, 68 foreign nationals were arrested, 47 of them being Vietnamese.

The debt that Vietnamese technical trainees accumulate before arriving in Japan may have contributed to the rise in crime, said Wako Asato, an associate professor at Kyoto University and an immigration policy expert, quoted by Asahi Shimbun.

Initial costs for Vietnamese coming to Japan average about ¥670,000, among the highest for participants, according to a survey by the Immigration Services Agency. Asato estimated the debts of Vietnamese people coming to Japan to be around ¥1 million. As people were unable to repay their debts during the internship, they started forming theft groups, he added.