Japanese wanted for tax evasion caught

Agents of the Bureau of Immigration (BI) apprehended yesterday a former assemblyman of Japan, who will soon be deported back to his native country to face a 254.97-million yen tax evasion case.

BI intelligence chief Victor Boco said the 64-year-old Masumi Ogawa, said to be a lawyer and former Osaka prefecture assemblyman, is considered an illegal alien because he was found carrying a fake passport using the name Hideki Tatsumi.

Ogawa arrived in the country last Nov. 11. Authorities had difficulty tracking him down because he went “from one hotel to another,” Boco said. He was arrested at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel as he was about to fly back to Japan.

According to the BI, Ogawa was elected to the Osaka prefectural assembly three times since 1987. He is suspected of evading around 250 million yen in taxes by hiding 700 million yen in income obtained from his involvement in transactions connected to an 11-story building in a prime business district of Osaka in 2006. He had complied with a request to submit a revised tax statement. – Evelyn Macairan