Photo/Illutration Lawyers release Line exchanges between a dead Takarazuka troupe member and her mother. (Jumpei Miura)

The lawyers representing the bereaved family of a 25-year-old Takarazuka Revue Co. member who died in September in an apparent suicide released a written opinion on Dec. 7 alleging power harassment within the troupe.

In the opinion, which they also submitted to the company, the family members claimed that senior troupe members and others had committed 15 acts of power harassment against the deceased woman, including long reprimands.

The written opinion also asked the company again to admit that power harassment had occurred.

The bereaved family released a statement on Dec. 7, saying, “We don’t know what to do with our anger when we imagine our daughter crying and apologizing for days and hours after being vehemently reprimanded.”

Hiroshi Kawahito, a lawyer representing the family, said, “The opinion letter and evidence we have provided is enough for (the company) to admit to the harassment and apologize.”

The Takarazuka Revue issued a comment that day, saying, “We take the feelings and thoughts of the bereaved family seriously and will continue to discuss the matter in good faith.”

The company had released an investigative report on the woman’s death on Nov. 14, in which it acknowledged management’s responsibility for the woman’s death.

It stated that the long hours of her troupe activities were a contributing factor, but said it could not confirm that power harassment by senior members had occurred.

In the bereaved family’s written opinion, they claimed that a senior troupe member had burned the woman’s forehead with a hair iron while curling her hair and that a senior member used a character-denigrating remark against her during a rehearsal for a show by young members.

In addition, they say that the head of the Cosmos Troupe and others repeatedly reprimanded the woman, saying, “All the mistakes of the junior members are your fault.”

The family said that all of these actions constituted power harassment.

The family also criticized the investigative methods of the company’s report, saying that even though there were multiple testimonies from members of the troupe, the report did not use them as evidence of power harassment.

As additional evidence to show that power harassment had occurred, the lawyers disclosed messages from Line and other platforms that the woman had exchanged with her mother, troupe members, a dermatologist and others.

One of piece of evidence indicated that the woman had been harshly reprimanded by senior troupe members for about an hour and a half starting at 10 p.m.

Meanwhile, a senior official of Hankyu Corp., which operates the Takarazuka Revue, told The Asahi Shimbun on Dec. 7 that the company intends to verify some of the evidence released by the bereaved family.

The family also released a photo that day of the woman’s forehead, which they said had been burned by a hair iron.

The family criticized the investigative report published by the Takarazuka Revue, which featured a nurse’s testimony that the burns were “of such a degree that they wouldn’t leave lasting damage,” saying that “it was not something that nurses should judge.”

As for the future, the senior Hankyu official said, “We are going to have a doctor look at the photograph of the burns,” while the company “will discuss what to do” with the other evidence, such as the Line messages.

(This article was written by Takashi Narazaki and Keiichi Kitagawa.)

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