Photo/Illutration Nineteen Japanese men are suspected of running a fraud ring at this hotel in the southern port city of Sihanoukville in Cambodia. (Toshiya Obu)

Nineteen Japanese men were extradited from Cambodia on April 11 as details of their suspected fraud operation emerged, including ties to a yakuza organization and forced participation in the criminal acts, sources said.

Officers of Tokyo’s Metropolitan Police Department are expected to arrest the fraud suspects during the flight to Japan.

The fraud ring, based in a hotel in Cambodia, is believed to have committed dozens of phone scams against people in Japan.

Tokyo police obtained arrest warrants for the 19 in connection with a woman in her 60s in the Japanese capital who was swindled on Jan. 24, the investigative sources said.

According to the sources, the fraudsters sent a message to the woman, and one of them pretended to be a representative of mobile phone carrier NTT Docomo.

The woman called the number shown in the message.

She was falsely told that she had charges in arrears for using a paid website, and the con artists tricked her into buying and transferring electronic money worth 250,000 yen ($1,900), the sources said.

The fraud ring appeared on the radar of local law enforcement in January, after the Japanese Embassy in Cambodia received an SOS call from a person who appeared to be a member of the organization.

“I have been forced to commit fraud at this hotel and cannot get out,” the message said.

Based on the tip, Cambodian authorities detained the 19 Japanese nationals, all men aged from 25 to 55, at the hotel in the southern port city of Sihanoukville in late January.

Some of the suspects have ties to an organized crime group in Japan, and police believe that some of the proceeds from the fraudulent acts were funneled to the yakuza syndicate.

The 19 men had stayed at multiple rooms at the hotel, but only one room was used to make phone calls, according to the sources.

About 60 smartphones believed to have been used in the fraud operation, as well as notes with names and contact information of potential victims, were seized from these hotel rooms.

The person who sought help from the embassy said only a few members of the group were allowed to leave the hotel, the sources said.

One of them is a 38-year-old man who was the target of a 2021 arrest warrant obtained by Tokyo police in another fraud case that occurred in Japan.

But the man left Japan for Cambodia in November 2021.

Police believe this man played a central role in the operation in Cambodia.

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