Japanese in fake marriage scam caught

MANILA, Philippines -  A Japanese man wanted over a fake marriage scam was arrested after he walked into the Bureau of Immigration headquarters to renew his expired visa, a BI official said yesterday.

BI acting commissioner Ronaldo Ledesma said in a statement they were looking for Yoshifumi Fujii, 49, “after authorities in Tokyo requested assistance, but he basically walked into his own detention” last Jan. 24.

“Japanese police and Interpol agents will arrive soon to bring him back to Japan and he will also be blacklisted from returning here,” he said.

Fujii allegedly operated a crime syndicate preying on Filipino women entertainers willing to pay money for fake Japanese marriages, Ledesma said.

“He charges them money and arranges the marriages with Japanese men. Once the woman arrives in Japan, she can now work and the man later leaves or divorces her,” he said. “It also works both ways, because the Japanese man can now stay in the Philippines and put up businesses.”

Ledesma said investigations by Japanese authorities discovered that Fujii had entered fake documents in the marriage registries at several towns in Aichi prefecture.

Some of the couples were arrested in May last year, but Fujii fled to the Philippines before police could enforce an arrest warrant issued by a local court.