THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
November 18, 2020 at 17:33 JST
OKAYAMA--Police here arrested the president of a real estate management company over allegations he physically assaulted a 62-year-old employee repeatedly and forced him to work for three and a half months without a single day off.
Yasuyuki Yokota, who lives in the city’s Kita Ward, was arrested Nov. 16 on suspicion of forced labor.
Police suspect that Yokota, 55, repeatedly assaulted the employee and forced him to do paperwork and other tasks for 107 days in a row between Jan. 22 and May 7.
Yokota has denied the allegations, calling them “completely untrue,” according to officers of Okayama Nishi police station who arrested him on suspicion of violating the Labor Standards Law.
Police asserted that Yokota confined the employee to his office by installing a motion detector that sounded an alarm whenever the man attempted to leave to go home. He also punched him in the face on a daily basis, police said.
Yokota also intimidated the man, telling him that “going home, quitting or something like that isn’t an issue here,” according to police.
The employee reportedly received a paltry 20,000 yen ($192) as a monthly salary.
Yokota was previously arrested on suspicion of inflicting bodily injury against the man. The Okayama District Public Prosecutors Office indicted him for violating the law on punishment of physical violence and other offenses.
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A motion detector like the one used by a company president arrested for alleged forced labor (Asahi Shimbun file photo)
