Reporter's look at yakuza gets personal

Looks like a good story. I hope they have a soft back, as I do not want to pay for the hard.

LOL! I hope this is placed in the 'Fiction' aisle at Kinokuniya. This Jake guy is masquerading. What a brave reporter he was for so long! And fearless of the yakuza, apparently. Foremost, the yakuza don't warn someone (especially a foreigner) if they don't do what they're told, they just kill you. Organized crime worldwide is like that. There is none of this, "If you don't we're going to you."

The yakuza negotiating with giving second chances to a gaijin newspaper reporter? Oh man, my sides are achin' from Jake Addle-brained's ridiculous machismo BS!

InTheKnow, the man was hired by the Yomiuri Shimbun in 1993 and worked there as a full-time employee in 2005. I used to see his byline in the vernacular Yomiuri (I remember he covered the burning down of that building in Kabukicho where 40-some people died in Aug. 2001). His stories also appeared in Daily Yomiuri and Metropolis. As I understand it, the yakuza were not giving him a "second chance" -- they were warning him not to publish a story in Japanese and he refrained from doing so.

Try googling his name, the web is full of accounts like this: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/fbi-helped-japanese-gangster-to-have-lifesaving-transplant-in-us-837427.html

I think I'm the only gaijin who don't find the Yaks as reporter in the mainstream media. All the yaks I know are very decent people who just love justice. There is no deception in the yak world. They keep their word. They are different from those young guys with tattoos on the street who wants to be called yaks. Real yaks don't show off.

Why do you think many Japanese businesses are broken or cannot recover? The Japanese Yakuza have a negative impact on small business confidence and survival. Maybe Mr Hatoyama will now rectify this long standing problem in Japanese society.

Japanese crime gangs are much more powerful than their American counterparts

NO. The American criminal organizations are much more powerful than extremely conspicuous Yakuza and other Japanese criminal organizations, despite the small Yakuza invasion in America(especially Hawaii) and Mexico for drug, human smuggling, and prostitution operations.

The American criminal organizations are similar to Japanese criminal organizations but their works are much more advanced, versatile, subtle, evasive, and secretive. They are known to run the U.S. media (propaganda to mislead the American society), 9/11/01 plot, military in Iraq and Afganistan (heroin market), puppet installations in the U.S. government, and banking system in America (enables the illegal immigrants to open the accounts in the American banks and micro-manages the mysterious transactions without the ordinary Americans' knowledge, especially via the Federal Reserve. The "Audit the Federal Reserve" bill is already supported by 300 members of the U.S. House of Representratives).

There are even further details which I can't tell on JapanToday. Too controversial, ugly, emotional, political, complicated, and conflict, unlike Yakuza who are only interested in making fast money.

Yakuza, despite their menacing tattoos, look like the gentle kids licking lollipops if compared to the American criminal organizations. Yakuza has no power to massively deceive Japanese, send the soldiers overseas to sacrifice, smuggle all kind of illegal drugs, and build many global military bases. The American criminal organizations already did their homeworks to implement these kinds of operations. Possibly, they looted other countries to support their banking system in America. They have tight control of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank. If there is anything wrong with the American banking system, it can be rescued by the central banks in other countries through the injections. They are as powerful as the Japanese emperors before Japan's defeat in the WWII.

Profile of Jake Adelstein:

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Tokyo-Vice/Jake-Adelstein/e/9780307378798

Jake should not fool around the Japanese underground to make money through writing a book.

Yakuza heavyweight Tadamasa Goto had sold out his own gang to the FBI in order to receive a liver transplant in the U.S. ahead of ailing American citizens

How nice. A very wonderful gift to FBI. Only to support the filthily rich people in America. I will love to see the billionaires to be eradicated in America, so the U.S. Constitution can be restored to the rightful owners: the ordinary American "citizens". Capitalism needs to modified to prevent a few special people from excessively generating money and taking advantage of the abundant profits to promote the political and self-serving causes.

I don't think that the fresh livers will do any good to them, as long as they don't know how to eat and exercise properly. My grandmother is about 92 year old and still walking and supporting by herself in her own house.

Ok, I am wondering if I can trust Jake on his Yakuza report, especially a fight to death. It sounds more like a fictitious story.

I think I'm the only gaijin who don't find the Yaks as reporter in the mainstream media. All the yaks I know are very decent people who just love justice. There is no deception in the yak world. They keep their word. They are different from those young guys with tattoos on the street who wants to be called yaks. Real yaks don't show off.

You have to be joking?

Loan sharks, with weekly 25% interest rates.

Soaplands, can't pay off your dept your lovely daughter now works here.

Nightclub protection money, want to operate a club after 1am, pay up.

pachiko palars, gambling is illegal in Japan, want to make sure there are no problems, pay up.

drugs...

drug trafficking...

human trafficking...

entertainment industry, want a number 1 hit, pay up.

street vendors... want a stall on a public street? pay up.

street vendors... want a stall on a public street? pay up

What a hell of a way to do a business in a large Japanese city!

The story of getting a warning is credible in light of the Mainichi incident here years ago when a reporter was killed by a person/persons unknown (down South). The net result was that the authorities went into overdrive disrupting a lot of business related to a certain organization that has its headquarters down in Kobe. The net result of this was that now reporters tend to get warned off rather than killed out of hand.

Just a comment on Japanese organized crime in the US. Back in the old days, there was a fair bit of action in both Hawaii and California. This involved taking over businesses (those frequented by Japanese tourists) and there was also a move to buy a couple of ailing banks on the US West Coast. Even earlier, certain Japanese crime figures were noted for their love of surfing in Hawaii. This interest, however, declined rapidly after certain individuals were caught coming back into Japan with surfboards full of drugs.

@ buddhism tech

"NO. The American criminal organizations are much more powerful than extremely conspicuous Yakuza and other Japanese criminal organizations, despite the small Yakuza invasion in America(especially Hawaii) and Mexico for drug, human smuggling, and prostitution operations...."snip".... They are as powerful as the Japanese emperors before Japan's defeat in the WWII."

are you on meds? if not you should be. the yakuza are more entrenched in japanese society than any of the organized crime in america. italian mobs are way less powerful than the yakuza, as with most of the other organized crime groups. i don't know where you are getting all your "conspiracy dung" from, but you need to educate yourself.

What does "yaks" mean? Are Mongolian cattle running organized crime in Japan?

After thinking about gogogo's report about the street vendors for a while, I believe that they are most likely to be found on the streets of Tokyo's red-light districts. Men will have to pay to walk on the sleaze and shady streets to look at tramps and possibly pretty women, from low profile to high profile. Maybe women get free passes. The street vendors must know the exact locations to make money.

certain individuals were caught coming back into Japan with surfboards full of drugs.

Very, very funny!

As a crime reporter, Adelstein spent much of his time prowling the hostess bars and “soapland” brothels of Tokyo’s red-light districts

I wanna be a crime reporter...

Ok, serious question. Who would win in the following battles:

U.S. Mafia vs. Yaks?

Mexican/Columbian Cartels vs. Yaks?

Russian Mob vs. Yaks?

1932 NY Yankees vs. Yaks?

Moderator: Stay on topic please.

BuddhismTech: No I'm talking about the Yakitori, hotdog, noddle, pizza vendors that have little mobile stands on the street or from their van / car. They are everywhere from shinjuku to roppongi to yoyogi park...

If you try to setup shop on a public street you'll be approached by someone asking for money to assist you not getting shut down by the police, rent or protection money (usually 75% of your income from whatever you're selling). Don't agree to it the police will come 20-30 mins later and shut you down...

The same thing happens on Japanese beaches, try to sell something ON the beach they will come along and ask for money to use their beach. The police will say "don't pay" but wont offer any help.

Just ask ANY street vender next time you see one, foreign or Japanese "do you pay money to the yakazu?"... The only time they might say no is that in the yakuza if you mess up you are punished to be made work in a yakuza run yakitori stand or something like that...

I thought we were supposed to be discussing the book under review. I guess the author wasted his time writing it, because it looks to me like everybody and his brother is an expert on the yakuza. I did notice that he covered at least one ordinary crime that appears to have had nothing to do with gangs.

Has anyone read the book and if so, is it worth buying?

Looks good I think I will pick it up myself.

I read an excerpt in MAXIM magazine's Oct. '09 issue ("Tokyo Death Wish -- Taking on the Japanese mob") and can't wait to get my hands on a copy.

Link below is magazine info only -- the article itself isn't posted online as far as I know

http://www.maxim.com/issues.html

@ buddhism tech

Thanks, that's the funniest thing I've read in ages.

And I was worried that posters on JT were starting to take themselves too seriously...

I can't wait to get my copy, I've been reading this guy's work for years and he's really good at getting info on these sleazy people.

@BuddhismTech- You live in Tennessee, right? To be honest with you, you won't learn much about crime in Japan from where you are. The street stalls are quite common (personally I'm a fan of the crepe vendors) and they DO pay protection money. It's not a sleazy/sexual thing as you assumed at all, more of a mom and pop place that as the poster stated, is forced to pay protection money. The modern Yaks are a mix of Michael Douglas from Wall Street and Al Capone. They have fingers in every pie, from big companies to those little stalls and they are far more dangerous than any American criminal organization I've met.

Money payments to street vendors...

Once while roaming through Kabukicho, I saw a gentleman walk up to one of those kebab places and get handed an envelope. The gentleman then went over to an old limo type car and handed it to someone in the backseat. Additionally, one of them (I forget which) made a notation in a notebook.

I thought... awwww... rent payments for street space.

"...in order to receive a liver transplant in the U.S. ahead of ailing American citizens..."

Wondering if this book lacks credibility. I'm sure it's possible he got a liver transplant. But to be put in priority like that? Is that slightly on the BS side? You tell me. I mean if I were a US doc (or whoever is responsible for administering the priority list) and the FBI told me to put him in higher priority I'd tell them to...(I can't say on this board but you can imagine)

@nishikat- He's on the level. The transplant WAS a sweet deal, but it's a trade-off the FBI is fully capable of arranging for reliable info. The FBI has a LOT more pull than any Japanese law enforcement organization does. They've been cutting sweet deals with crims for years to get relevant info, sometimes it works and sometimes they get scr#wed on the deal. That was the case with Goto.

Adelstein’s Tokyo is a veritable Gomorrah where nearly every act of intimacy is legally bought and sold.

I'd say that's a pretty small slice of the city.

Most mobsters are posers, but you pay up because 1 in 10 of them aren't. And the posers know who to call for backup, because they sure as hell don't have the balls themselves.

Lots of people get priority for transplants for one reason or another. Getting it for snitching in a criminal case isn't a surprise. It's not like there is one real list to begin with - there's compatability and transportation of the organ to consider.

Good find Beelzebub.

For those interested in the Maxim article, check here:

http://www.mediafire.com/?ny4emqn2tw2

What does "yaks" mean? Are Mongolian cattle running organized crime in Japan?

hahahaha. Funny

No I'm talking about the Yakitori, hotdog, noddle, pizza vendors that have little mobile stands on the street or from their van / car. They are everywhere from shinjuku to roppongi to yoyogi park

Oh! Oh! My mistake and misunderstanding! I just mixed up stall(standing) with stroll(walking). I was wrongly implying that some people would have to pay to a street vendor, sponsored by a Yakuza organization, for walking on a certain street in a red-light district. No problem.

BuddhismTech- You live in Tennessee, right? To be honest with you, you won't learn much about crime in Japan from where you are.

Yes. You are almost right. I live in northern Alabama, the home of so many smart people. I live there almost all of my life. Well, gogogo just explained about a street vendor to me. Now, I perfectly understood. I only learned about Japanese crimes through watching many Japanese movies and checking on some Japanese mainstream-media websites, like JapanToday, News on Japan, etc.

Personally, I think that I am better off if I don't know too much about criminal organizations, from Japan to America.

Sorry, I still believe that America's criminal organizations are much more lethal. They are closely working with another country which I can't identify on JapanToday. They don't have to act aggressively and violently. I am referring them to the financial cartels who handle propaganda, financial networks, underground banking, military adventures, border opening, unstoppable drug smuggling, surveillance (from camera to Internet), corrupted bills, bailouts, job outsourcing, medical scams, global warming scams, etc . Like I mentioned previously, I really can't specifically discuss on JapanToday, otherwise it can lead to a big argument and upset someone.

I consider the Yakuza very powerful IF they know how to use the Japanese propaganda to encourage Japanese to get involved in a war and largely manage the military industries. If Japan and America "switch" criminal organizations, Japan will experience some undesirable wars in other countries and so many lies made by the mainstream media, while America is dealing with prostitution, drug, and racketeering problems which are "already well known" to America. I will say that Japan is preferring to be comfortable with the Yakuza over the American criminal organizations.

Purchased the book, looking forward to reading.

The Yakuza are saviors for the public. They have honor and the samurai spirit. They are very generous people.

gogogo, wish you good luck with your book. Maybe I am wasting my time discussing about the book. Sex and violence sell very well in all countries, within our planet. A lot of people, both women and men, are strongly attracted to them. They can be ubiquitously found on TV, computer games, books, and Internet. Someone, like Jake Adelstein, is smart enough to take advantage of the human race's addiction and weakness to make money for himself.

According to my perception, Jake Adelstein, American himself, is considered more powerful than a Yakuza member, because he knows how to be nosy around the distant foreigners' business or maybe lie a little to boost a public's interest.

BuddhismTech, I don't get it. You haven't read the book, but you are accusing the writer of lying. What is your agenda here? Please read the book and THEN say what you think was a lie, or else DON'T read the book and keep your tater trap shut.

I'm a bit skeptical about Adelstein because he sometimes comes across as a non-stop self-promoter who can't remind you often enough that he was the first/only American/white person/foreigner to do this/that in Japan. But there are indications that his book may actually be worth buying: http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/randoEMS/Jake_Adelstein.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.amazon.com/Tokyo-Vice-American-Reporter-Police/dp/0307378799&usg=__1jLA-hFTUaXQkc69jN0QI4rkyCU=&h=154&w=200&sz=5&hl=ja&start=14&tbnid=e_X1JAvMC2iPdM:&tbnh=80&tbnw=104&prev=/images%3Fq%3Djake%2Badelstein%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Dja%26sa%3DGth

Going back to the part of "...in order to receive a liver transplant in the U.S. ahead of ailing American citizens..."

I found this:

http://www.organtransplants.org/understanding/unos/

Which quotes:

"...General principles, such as a patient's medical urgency, blood, tissue and size match with the donor, time on the waiting list and proximity to the donor, guide the distribution of organs. Under certain circumstance, special allowances are made for children. For example, children under age 11 who need kidneys are automatically assigned additional points. Factors such as a patient's income, celebrity status, and race or ethnic background play no role in determining allocation of organs..."

I guess it's misunderstood. Unless it's involving the son of Christ the FBI or any other organization cannot influence the priority list in any way. OK, I accept he made it to an American hospital but he just got the liver "ahead of ailing American citizens" because his case was at a certain medical priority as decided by the transplant protocol- and they found a match for him. Even if the guy was evil- medically it sounds ethical to me. The docs just did their jobs. Simply taken out of context at least in this discussion. But I wonder if the book claims the FBI had direct influence over the priority list.

You actually take that literally? Here's a hint: they're lying. By omission.

The docs just did their jobs. Simply taken out of context at least in this discussion. But I wonder if the book claims the FBI had direct influence over the priority list.

Nishikat: Have you ever heard of MONEY? It works wonders. The yakuza greased UCLA Medical Center's palm with a generous donation.

You know, it's really ludicrous to see people leap in and "debate" things they know absolutely nothing about. Other media picked on the liver transplant story well over a year ago and copies are posted all over the web. Here's some friendly advice: try acquiring some information instead of just speculating on what you think might have happened.

heavyweight Tadamasa Goto had sold out his own gang to the FBI in order to receive a liver transplant in the U.S. ahead of ailing American citizens

I think that this sentence is a bit confusing. I did misread it. At first, I thought that liver transparents were intended for the rich American people. But it turned out to be the four Japanese gang members, including Tadamasa Goto, who were receiving the liver transparents at UCLA. Wow. Shocking.

The FBI was willing to help him, because he was going to give them more information about the Yamaguchi-gumi front companies, Japanese gangs, and mobsters. FBI had long suspected that the Yakuza was involved in money laundering in the U.S.?

Very, very, very ludicrous and insane!!!!! Why did the U.S. government "allow" the yakuza to visit the U.S., so they could perform money laundering? Very scandalous! The U.S. government has very, very notorious reputation for allowing criminals from different countries to enter in the U.S. Then the FBI, who are the agents of the U.S. government, wants to know a bit about the foreign criminals' businesses, after they do something bad in the U.S.? So stupid and ironic! Why doesn't the FBI investigate the corrupted U.S. government in the first place?! I am greatly irked by the U.S. government's endless scandals!

I have found a much better article which explains about the Yakuza's relationship with the FBI on the liver transparents.

Link: http://www.atypicallife.com/atypical-fbi-coordinates-yakuza-transplants/

Oh well! I am treating Tadamasa Goto (and his Japanese associates), Jake Adelstein, and some officials in the U.S. government as if they are "accomplices". Very twisting! The FBI is being messed up!

I am starting to believe that Tadamasa Goto and Jake Adelstein are actually good friends, instead of acting as real enemies. I think that Jake wrote a "Tokyo Vice" book to save himself and the Yakuza, while making the FBI to look bad. His book is developed to misguide the world.

I am assuming that Jake and Goto are partners who are both involved in criminal businesses, such as associating with underground banking (a central bank can possibly operate and function as an underground bank) and reinforcing the international criminal organizations.

Very, very, very shameful at the United States Department of Homeland Security and the United States Department of Justice for not doing their jobs! They go to the hell!!! Too many corrupted officials working there. They are more interested in protecting the Yakuza than the ordinary Americans.

^^No, the DHS, FBI and all the US acronyms were doing their jobs.

A liver transplant can only give the boss a few more years; info on Yakuza can save lives in the long run.