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Child prostitution finds mobile pimp
By Suvendrini Kakuchi
September 26. 2001
Tokyo - The arrest this month of a high school teacher linked to the death of a
12-year-old girl with whom he got acquainted over the telephone, puts the
spotlight on telephone dating clubs that have sprouted across Japan.
Ken Fukumoto, 34, was arrested on September 8 after police traced him through
the victim's mobile phone. He told police that he got to know Noriko Kamie
through a phone dating club. He said that he had planned to pay for sex with
her and to videotape the scene. But the girl jumped out of the car while they
were driving on an expressway last July.
Police found Kamie handcuffed and bleeding on a highway in Kobe on July 24. She
was taken to hospital, where she died the following day. Authorities theorized
that while she lay on the road after escaping from her captor, she was hit by
another vehicle, hence the broken skull. Earlier that day, Kamie, a
middle-school student, told her friends she was going to "meet a male friend"
who had called her on her mobile phone, but whom she had never met before.
There have been a few killings of women by the male dates they met through
phone or website dating systems, but the death of 12-year-old Kamie sent shock
waves across Japan. The tragedy also highlighted the pitfalls of Japan's widely
used telephone dating clubs and the lack of protection for children in this
system. In May, a 25-year-old man was arrested in Kyoto for allegedly killing a
19-year-old college student he became acquainted with through a wesbite dating
system.
"There is clear evidence the telephone dating system is a hotbed for teenage
prostitution," says Yoshie Takahashi of Stop Child Prostitution, a
non-governmental organization working to stop the widespread sale of child
pornography in Japan. The telephone dating system, "telekura" for short in
Japanese, developed with the rapid growth of mobile phone users in the last
three years and is now firmly entrenched in Japanese society.
Police estimate there are almost 4,000 operating dating clubs across Japan,
with some clubs believed to have more than 30,000 men registered as members.
They are widely viewed as promoting prostitution, including of children, and
have been regulated under prefectural ordinances. Of the 836 cases of child
prostitution recorded last year, 53 percent involved telephone dating clubs.
A male mobile phone owner can register himself in one of the "telekura" clubs
for a fee and call a female member registered in the same club. He pays for the
call and introduction separately. Female members, mostly young girls, register
their numbers under pseudonyms. They do not pay to register and call toll-free.
Often, operators of these clubs have no fixed premises, an arrangement that
makes it difficult to verify information about them or track them down. Men can
register at pornographic video shops or adult shops.
Surveys conducted by the Tokyo metropolitan government last year reveal that
the system is hugely popular among the Japanese. More than 25 percent of female
high school students covered in the survey replied they had dialed the dating
clubs to register their mobile phone numbers. "It's just fun to get a call from
a man you don't know," said a high school student interviewed recently on
Japanese television. "I am not planning to meet him or anything, and besides I
get paid a little to chat with the man, so it's like having some extra income
to play with."
The survey also revealed that some women registered in the dating clubs
answered as many as 100 calls a day. Those who were polled said that they
sometimes meet the men and enjoy being taken out to expensive dinners and being
given clothes.
The Japanese government passed a new law in June requiring telephone club
operators to confirm that their clients are more than 18 years old. But many
dating clubs simply ignored the law. Controlling these clubs, which are
registered only on the Internet, is not easy, said a police spokesman.
Professor Yasuyuki Kawahara, who teaches social psychology at Yokohama City
University, said that the anonymity of telephone dating is especially appealing
to the Japanese who find it easier to reveal their true feelings through the
computer. "The Japanese are restricted in personal relationships because of
strict social norms that frown on revealing their true feelings among people
they know," he explained. "Thus, meeting unknown people through the Internet
gives them a feeling of being free from social norms."
The National Police Agency has proposed stricter laws that include asking
telephone dating clubs to require prospective female customers to present
identification for safety and security reasons. The police agency also wants to
set a fine of up to one million yen (US$8,500) on operators who ignore the law.
But opponents wonder whether this will protect children.
"'Terekura' can be easly stopped by banning such services," says Yoshioka
Shiro, an activist against child prostitution in developing countries. "But the
government is dragging its feet because it is a big business and involves the
mobile phone market and the telecommunications market."
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U.S.
criticizes Japan for teenage prostitution
3-5-2002
Tougher
action sought on Internet child porn
6-16-2000
New
Japanese anti-porn law aims at child sex trade
1-28-2000 |
