6 Nabbed for Tokyo Arson Possibly Linked to Land Acquisition

Tokyo, Feb. 20 (Jiji Press)–Police have arrested six men in their 20s to 30s, including an apartment management company employee, for allegedly setting fire to a private house and an adjacent vacant apartment building in Tokyo’s Shinagawa Ward last year, investigative sources said Friday. The site is located in a densely populated residential area of Koyama in the ward, about 200 meters northeast of Musashi-Koyama Station on Tokyu Corp.’s Meguro Line, where redevelopment is underway. Tokyo’s Metropolitan Police Department suspects that the motive behind the alleged arson cases was linked to land acquisition. In addition to the apartment management company worker, Hiroki Naito, 31, the other suspects arrested included Shunta Naoi, 29, of Tokyo’s Adachi Ward, and Ryutaro Yamagami, 28, of Kita Ward in Saitama Prefecture, both of whose occupations are unknown. At around 5:10 a.m. on Oct. 31 last year, two men including Naoi allegedly poured gasoline on a wall of the house of a man in his 60s and set it on fire, as instructed by Naito. Naito is also suspected of ordering three other suspects, including Yamagami, to pour gasoline into a room on the first floor of an adjacent vacant apartment and set it on fire between 1:05 a.m. and 1:10 a.m. on Nov. 18, damaging walls and other sections. It is believed that Naito ordered the five to carry out the arson by phone and other means. Nearby security camera footage caught the men fleeing the site by car. No one was injured in the two incidents. Several years ago, a redevelopment plan was drawn up to combine several pieces of land around the site. Although land transactions have been active in the area, some residents, including the man in his 60s, have refused to sell their plots. The police suspect that Naito planned to use the fires to harass residents opposing the redevelopment plan. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]