Local Japan official found with shotgun blast to chest — Lectured against nuclear power after Fukushima

Published: January 3rd, 2012 at 3:25 pm ET
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Anti nuclear town councilor died in undetermined manner, Fukushima Diary, January 3, 2012:

SOURCE: http://sp.mainichi.jp/m/news.html?cid=20120104k0000m040124000c

  • Mr.Uemura Yasuhiro (64)
  • Town Councilor of Kowaura Minamiise Machi Mie
  • Found dead in his car
  • Bleeding from his chest
  • According to police, he had his chest shot
  • A shotgun was put outside of the car
  • He went out for his farm to keep the crows away with his gun
  • Police assumes it was suicide or a gun accident
  • He acted against the construction of Ashihama nuclear plan of Chubu Electric Power
  • After the Fukushima accident, he traveled around in Japan to give lectures against nuclear

Translation: Crow extermination: South Ise Cho discussion, at inside of car of car in death vicinity shot gun triple, Mainichi, Jan. 3, 2012:

3rd 2:45 PM around, the same town discussion of Mie prefecture south Ise Cho old harmony inlet, Uemura healthy width it is (64), inside the car of the parking zone of the ranch which by his manages, the wife to discover the fact that the blood is let flow from the chest, 119th it did. The death was verified at the hospital ahead conveying.

According to Ise station, Uemura receiving the bullet to the chest, we have collapsed with the driver’s seat, the shot gun (total length approximately 113 centimeters, top and bottom 2 connected type) had fallen external. In order for Uemura same day around 10:30 AM, to exterminate the crow of the ranch, you say that you went out with 1 people, with the gun. You investigate the same station from accidental explosion accident and both sides of suicide.

Uemura 90 years, was elected for the first time in old Nanto Cho discussion, included after the south Ise Cho combining and 6 period total had served. It opposed to the reed beach nuclear plant which the Chubu Electric Power Co., Ltd. plans, endeavored in enactment of inhabitant poll regulations of 93 years. Fukushima 1st nuclear accident was received, recently lecture and the like of the counter nuclear plant was done at every place.

Published: January 3rd, 2012 at 3:25 pm ET
By
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78 comments

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78 comments to Local Japan official found with shotgun blast to chest — Lectured against nuclear power after Fukushima

  • farawayfan farawayfan

    Ah yes, shotgun to the chest, very common accident and way to commit suicide with a long-barreled weapon. I suppose he did this after successfully strangling himself?

    Frightening.


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  • PoorDaddy PoorDaddy

    RIP Mr. Yasuhiro.
    Been around guns all my life. Its damn hard to shoot yourself in the chest with any long gun, shotgun or otherwise…..not impossible, but extremely awkward and difficult.
    I would put my money on some Tepco/Gov asshole being the trigger man for sure.


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  • hbjon hbjon

    When they find the perpetraitor, he will need to be punished. Any suggestions?


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  • TheWorldIsBlind

    confine him to the no go zone without protection


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  • And make him drink basement water..


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  • Grampybone Grampybone

    Looks like TEPCO.gov’s response to decent is a 12 gauge to the chest. This guy did not kill himself in a car by shooting himself in the chest. It would have been damn hard to do with a full length hunting gun.


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    • Clocka

      But the police will say it’s suicide. After all, they are on it together, and the police also have families to protect.


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    • HoTaters HoTaters

      TEPCO does serve Chiba Prefecture, but let’s not be too hasty pointing the finger, eh, folks?

      Yes, this death does look AWFULLY suspicious. Agreed, it’s pretty hard to pull the trigger on a shotgun while it’s pointed at your own head.


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  • bmurr bmurr

    Maybe the gun got angry and killed its owner?


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  • So how do you get your own shotgun OUTSIDE your own car, and also find a way to shoot yourself with it?

    I cannot imagine any scenario where this is possible..

    However, it is very easy to imagine someone else standing outside the car, with the shotgun… etc.

    I think the official suicide explanation is that a black medium sized crow flew over his car. This guy asked the crow to shoot him. So he stuck the shotgun out of his sunroof, so the crow could shoot him with it.. The crow flew down, picked the shotgun up, turned it around through the sunroof, shot the guy with it, and then dropped the gun on the ground next to the car, and then flew away.. Voila, no tire tracks, no footprints, no fingerprints. Yup, it must be suicide.

    If they check all local crows for gunpowder residue, they will find the one guilty crow that matches the description above.

    All joking aside… this is a serious offense, and I certainly hope that the police are not involved in covering this all up.


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    • hbjon hbjon

      Obviously, a man does not shoot himself with a shotgun unless a samurai sword is too difficult to come by. There in Japan most men his age have perfectly fine samurai swords. Nowthen, everyone knows that a Japanese man does not commit suicide without a suicide note. Because he must apologize to his friends and family. Even if he lost all his hair and his thyroid is restricting his breathing, he must do the suicide note.


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      • Clocka

        Even Yamaguchi Tamon, with his carrier going down in Midway, had time to write suicide note because it was mandatory. His body didn’t survive the sinking; his suicide note did.


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  • aigeezer aigeezer

    Very murky translation so far. Lots of interpretations possible.

    Among the (many) odd bits:

    Bulleted item (not that kind): “He went out for his farm to keep the crows away with his gun”. That would tend to argue against someone shooting him (how would they know to expect him to turn up with a gun?) but of course it’s not conclusive.

    Bulleted item: “Police assumes it was suicide or a gun accident”. Surely they shouldn’t assume anything at all until they investigate.

    And this weird bit… “at inside of car of car in death vicinity shot gun triple” (sic) which could mean anything or nothing, but the mind boggles that it might mean three shots fired from a two-barrel weapon.

    Gotta wait for more info.


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  • Ace33

    they already have covered it up by determining Sucide there will be no more investigation case closed coverd up just like everything nuclear


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  • The accident scenario would be, self-injury with the weapon outside the car, lean weapon against car, climb in, close door, die. Forensic work would be able establish some of that. But, I agree, lecturing against nuclear in Japan at this stage of the game is twelve gauge dangerous. Like falling out of the sky in your private plane when you indicate you may turn state’s evidence for writing software to steal an election, or drowning in your hot tub after trying to tell the world the Gulf’s sea floor is is leaking crude under pressure from below.


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  • VicFromOregon VicFromOregon

    Perhaps murder or manslaughter, but, not by the usual suspects of unethical soul sucking gutless nuclear pimps who might have a tail on Uemura. Afterall, aren’t a lot of gangsters working the clean up at Fukushima? Wouldn’t have to go to far to find someone willing, maybe. But, I’m thinking more likely it’s possible that another farmer nearby walked up to talk with him. Maybe complained about Uemura’s lecturing because it raised concerns about the safety of farm crops. Maybe costing that farmer lots of money. A little heated argument. A push. A grab for the gun. Other farmer shoots Uemura in a fit of rage. Freaks. Drops gun and runs. Uemura, if not already seated in car, falls back into front seat to die.


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  • Cataclysmic Cataclysmic

    the dog did it? http://dogblog.dogster.com/2011/12/12/another-dog-shoots-another-hunter/

    ..and of course it was wearing old bottle glasses and carrying a bunch of bananas


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  • Mauibrad Mauibrad

    Yakuza have a big stake in nuclear in Japan.


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  • Heart of the Rose Heart of the Rose

    ..hummm..the victim is in the car.. the shot gun had fallen externally..
    ..Blatant murder….
    ..but here is where the Yakuza are fools…
    …Radiation is equal opportunity….the familes..loved ones of the Yakuza will suffer the same fate as the rest of the population…
    they will travel the same roads….eat the same food…die the same painful death….


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  • Heart of the Rose Heart of the Rose

    True…but Korea is getting… a dose as well…


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      • HoTaters HoTaters

        OK, let’s be careful here …. comments of this nature can be offensive to some of us.


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        • HoTaters HoTaters

          Y’know, that’s on the level of saying let’s nuke the U.S. out of existence because the CIA has done so many nasty things outside the U.S. to wreak havoc in other people’s countries, nuke the Russians because they were oppressive in Eastern Europe, nuke the Germans because they had Hitler, nuke the Iranians because they’re “rag heads” and we don’t like their religeon, etc., etc. ad nauseum.

          People, yes, the wee little people that make up most of the population of every nation, everywhere on Earth, are just looking to mind their own business and eek out an existence.

          The innocents of every tongue, nation, and tribe certainly don’t deserve the retribution that would be meted out to corrupt members of the military or governments.

          That kind of inflammatory statement is just the kind of thing that foments unending hatred and endless warfare. And you’d best bet TPTB use that kind of incendiary comment to fan the fires of hatred, and use it to their own advantage.

          How sad that you have not learned the many lessons of history.


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      • hanaloa hanaloa

        Damn, this was worst than your last bullshit comment about hoping Korea “gets its nuclear share”
        …I guess at least you clarified what you meant…


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      • Spectrometising

        Clocka, you sound like you might be commenting about a sporting event. Take a beer or whatever you use and watch some baseball or soccer or something.


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      • Waffles

        Let me clear things up a bit. I’m a South Korean, so I learned a lot about the things that Japan did. It seems obvious Clocka is blatantly lying, since there is a mountain pile of records on the crimes that the Japanese committed. Just google Unit 731 or the Nanjing massacre and you’ll know what I mean. What Clocka said is the equivalent of blaming the Jews for the Holocaust.

        And also, I dont know where Clocka got the idea that Yakuza has a connection with the North Koreans. If you have even a droplet of Japanese blood, you cant get in the inner circle of power at Pyeongyang.


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  • Oh and the final detail of this suicide is that the guy wanted to make sure he would not live through this, so he threw the crow up a few spare shells, since this was a double barrel shotgun..

    The crow let loose with both barrels, then reloaded TWICE, and let him have a couple more into the chest for good measure, shot him three times total..before dropping the gun outside the car.

    Since the translation is so ridiculously poor, it is hard to determine if he shot himself three times, thirty times, or at 3 AM in the morning, which is when crows are out in force. (Camoflaged black crows love flying in the darkness, don’t you know?)

    Those darn crows are smart.. I mean they know how to steal stuff, fire weapons and kill people. I think we should really be worried about them as terrorists, who may be responsible for disabling Fukushima… I think the crows did it.


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    • hbjon hbjon

      A quick observation about crows. Crows seem to be the only bird that knows when a car is coming down the freeway and won’t hit it. Because they stop feeding on the roadkill and step onto the shoulder, wait till the car passes, then hop back to the roadkill.


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      • I’ve seen video from Japan of Crows deciphering walk/don’t-walk lights regulating a cross-walk.

        the crows drop nuts onto the crosswalks and wait for the cars to run over the shells.

        When the light changes, the crows fly down to the cross walk and feast.

        They watch the lights. When the light changes, BEFORE the cars move, the crows fly back up to their high perches.

        I love crows and ravens. I hope they survive in Fukushima…


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  • VicFromOregon VicFromOregon

    Perhaps, for people like those within the Yakuza, life in already dangerous. What is one more thing?


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  • arclight arclight

    didnt know if i should post this here but on hindsight, it would be appropriate!! if it at least it honours those with the courage of their convictions in some way…

    repost

    do you check your spam filter box regularly?

    cautionary tale here..

    i hwve been in correspondence with a well known japanese organisation.. i have been recieved emails earlier in the year ok! however, i was expecting a response to some info and eventually found the email.. it was a person to person, no cc. the email did not come up on my mobile as it normally would and deposited the email in the spam box! i happen to look in there on the off chance!!

    somewhere along the line the filter settings have changed to include person to person anti nuke type organisational emails from japan!!

    dont you just love the telecommunications corporations? they are connected to the military you know!!

    interested to get your thoughts….


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    • arclight arclight

      of course if it could be proven that anti nuclear activists are targetted then the telecommunications companies might be also liable for a charge of murder.. thinking karen silkwood and the above article here… food for thought maybe?


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    • arclight arclight

      correction .. the email was cc to the organisation from a personal email.. 1 cc to get into a spam box? anyway, bear it in mind!


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  • arclight arclight

    “But as the Times notes, the union was soon violently busted: “Although more than 180 workers belonged to the union at its peak, its leaders were soon visited by thugs who kicked down their doors and threatened to harm their families, he said. ‘They were not allowed to speak up,’ Mr. Nakajima said. ‘Once you enter a nuclear power plant, everything’s a secret.’””

    “Since the mid-1970s, the Times notes, some 50 former workers have received workers’ compensation after developing leukemia and other forms of cancer. But the real number of those poisoned is almost undoubtedly higher–since it’s often impossible to definitively link workers’ illnesses to radiation exposure.

    Shorrock, for example, cites a book reviewed in a 1980 issue of AMPO magazine in which journalist Horie Kunio detailed his experiences working as a contract laborer at Fukushima and other nuclear plants. According to AMPO, Kunio’s book detailed how the work of contract laborers:….”

    “And since Japan is frequently touted as a model for how nuclear power can be “done right,” you might expect nuclear workers would get better treatment. But as Bloomberg News recently noted

    A week before becoming ground zero for the world’s biggest nuclear crisis since 1986, the Fukushima-Daiichi plant offered $11 an hour for full-time maintenance work in an area of Japan that was lagging even before last month’s earthquake and tsunami struck.

    The wage, the same as McDonald’s Corp. pays for part-time work in Tokyo, shows the scale of the northern Tohoku region’s economic blight and indicates towns may never recover from the disaster.”

    http://socialistworker.org/2011/04/19/fukushimas-disposable-workers


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  • StillJill StillJill

    No,..no reason Arc. No reason I SEE lost tepco workers wearing cement boots, swimmin’ with the fishies either,……


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  • StillJill StillJill

    Their blood cries out,…just as the blood of the deformed infants being strangled or bagged, as we speak.


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  • maaa

    Breaking News: 0.76 microSv/h from Seaweed from Korean east coast http://fukushima-diary.com


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  • James2

    Sounds like he took a class at the Ken Foster school of contortionist suicide.


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  • arclight arclight

    Gang hit prompts fears of mob war in Tokyo

    Murder of senior yakuza spawns series of shootings
    · Japan’s biggest syndicates in feud over territory

    Justin McCurry in Tokyo
    Thursday February 8, 2007

    “Despite increasing police crackdowns, yakuza membership is rising amid richer pickings from extortion, prostitution, drug smuggling, property deals and even stock market transactions as the Japanese economy emerges from the doldrums.

    There were about 87,000 gangsters active in Japan at the end of 2005, according to the National Police Agency.

    Nearly 40,000 belong to the Yamaguchi-gumi, which has had much more success at attracting members from smaller gangs which are increasingly under pressure from police investigations”

    http://benjaminfulford.com/forbs11.html


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  • arclight arclight

    Benjamin Fulford

    A vist to a yakuza gangster’s headquarters in a Japanese war zone

    “This was no ordinary boss. He was in charge of the most dangerous district red-light district in Japan. His gang had just finished, and won, a brutal war with Chinese triads. His 70-man division had killed about 15 people over the past several years. This figure does not include those who simply vanished. The Yakuza prefer that bodies are never discovered so they can avoid being forced by the police to give up one of their members to face arrest for the crime.

    Bodies are disposed of in several ways: boiled into broth for ramen noodles, minced up and mixed in with fish cake, dissolved in acid and, most common of all, buried in shallow graves in the mountains. People in debt to the gangs are sent to work on fishing boats and, they are told, have their wages garnisheed to pay the debt. In reality they are heavily insured and get “washed overboard.”

    The boss agreed to meet me one evening at his office. I was told to wait by a certain phone booth where a mean looking guy with a shaved head came to get me. A couple of touts saw who I was with and looked at me with pity in their eyes. “Watch your language when you meet the boss,” the guy warned me.

    The only way up to the office was up several flights of stairs exposed to the street. At the top of each flight was a steel door. Some were open, exposing rooms full of rough looking, tattooed men wearing shorts and t-shirts. The boss was waiting for me at the top floor.”

    http://benjaminfulford.com/Yauza.html


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  • arclight arclight

    Nuclear Ginza: Japan’s secret at-risk labor force and the Fukushima disaster
    April 1, 2011 | Sarah Noorbakhsh

    “One would like to think that things have changed over the years, but even now in Fukushima, reports are being published that tell how people are being lured with offers of up to ¥400,000 per day to work at the nuclear reactors–many of whom are victims of the tsunami. Because of high radiation levels the amount of time each person can spend inside is limited. TEPCO confirms they’re working with outside agencies to secure enough workers to keep operations running, but refused to comment on how much each person is being paid….”

    From this

    http://www.japansubculture.com/2011/04/nuclear-ginza-japans-secret-at-risk-labor-force-and-the-fukushima-disaster/


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  • arclight arclight

    “In Auckland Harbour, New Zealand, on July 10th 1985, French navy combat frogmen placed two mines against the hull of the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior. At ten minutes to midnight, the bombs exploded, sinking the ship and killing photographer Fernando Pereira. The French government were desperately trying to hide the truth about the bombing and the truth about its nuclear weapons testing in the Pacific ocean, and would have gone to any lengths to silence its opponents. This is a film about international espionage, government cover-up and the nuclear arms race, which has disturbing parallels with today’s ‘War on Terror’.”

    theres a documentary but heres the 20th anniversary minidoc

    watch the bit between 3 and 4 minutes!!


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  • arclight arclight

    Tepco blackmail government over size of exclusion zone!

    Gov’t, TEPCO to negotiate over use of public funds
    Politics Jan. 03,
    TOKYO —

    “The government and Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) are set to begin negotiations over the amount of funding the utility should receive from a government-backed entity in order to strengthen its financial standing.

    TEPCO has said that its liabilities may exceed its assets by the end of 2012 due to its compensation of families affected by the Fukushima nuclear crisis and the cost of decontamination, NHK reported.

    Furthermore, TEPCO estimates that it will need to pay an additional 800 billion yen by the end of March to run thermal power plants, in addition to compensation payments.

    In total, TEPCO is seeking 1.7 trillion yen from the Nuclear Damage Compensation Facilitation Corporation up from a previous 1.01 trillion yen. TEPCO says the increase results from government moves to widen eligibility criteria for claimants and to alter the evacuation zone restrictions around the stricken plant.”

    http://www.japantoday.com/category/politics/view/govt-tepco-to-negotiate-over-use-of-public-funds?utm_campaign=jt_newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_source=jt_newsletter_2012-01-03_PM


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    • arclight arclight

      looks like the government are going to pay up then

      “Noda said that this week he planned to complete a final draft of the party’s tax and social reform plan calling for Japan’s sales tax to double, from 5% to 10%, by 2015. The sales tax would rise to 8%rcent in 2014.

      Noda said he hoped to hold talks with opposition parties, which control the less powerful upper house of parliament, as early as next week, and to submit the bill to parliament by the end of fiscal year, which ends in March.”

      did mention why though

      “Noda said authorities would work to decontaminate the region from radioactive fallout, while ensuring compensation and health checks for those affected by the disaster.”

      sounds like the compensation payments that are going to tepco… upfront perhaps??

      very happy shareholders… wait a bit .. shares recover a bit, then sell sell sell… seems like a plan!!


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  • Clocka

    Where are the families of Vince Foster now? Most likely living in a different names, by now.

    In Japan, the family of people ‘suicided’ know what they are facing, and in almost all cases, they will accept the pittance from ‘They’ and keep it silent for the rest of their lives.

    The government can’t function without the yakuza, many of them with connections to North Korea, so it will wash their hands.

    Again, once North Korea is gone, the yakuza will have to find another escape route which will be tough.


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  • bobbis1972

    The circumstances surrounding his death speak for themselves.

    1 The gun is outside the car.

    2 He has a chest wound inside the car.

    3 NO suicide note.

    4 An ACTIVIST drawing attention to the inability of the Japanese government to be responsible enough to maintain Nuclear industry, and, the damage this has caused to japan.

    The only way somebody would give up their weapon is to give it to somebody they think is in authority to show that they are complying with any regulations, or, to have it inspected as the weapon they are licensed to own.

    I believe he was approached by someone in a uniform of some kind, probably the police, who asked to inspect the weapon and he had no issues giving the weapon to an authority figure.
    You wouldn’t pass a shotgun to a complete stranger.
    Also far easier to shoot yourself under the chin inside a vehicle.
    Was likely under duress to leave the car and grabbed the weapon as it was being pointed at him.
    Weapon discharged and abandoned.

    I don’t for one second believe it was suicide.


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    • Clocka

      But, my point is, where is his family?

      The wife probably remarried and took her new hubby’s name, and if there were any children they would have followed suit. No brothers, sisters, or friends of Vince are coming out to say that it was not a suicide – they had 8 years of Bush regime to say it otherwise.

      That’s how the world works.


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  • bobbis1972

    Also.

    I found an article claiming that those people who owed the yakuza money and failed to pay it, had life insurance policies taken out in their names and were then made to go and work on fishing boats where they inexplicably had accidents and never returned.
    This left the yakuza holding a life insurance policy to be paid out on.

    With all the fukushima workers that have gone missing, a figure in the 200+ people, and the fact that the yakuza are involved in the sourcing of these people from the homeless day labourer pools, i wonder how many had life insurance policies taken out in their names before they went missing.
    interesting line of research for a japanese speaking person who could collate all the required information.


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  • markww markww

    MURDER how can you shoot your self dead in the chest and then throw the weapon out of the vehicle if your already dead


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  • Mainichi Version of the story. Still accident or suicide. Like that guy who stabbed himself in the back after slashing his own throat and falling on some bullets at the bottom of an elevator shaft… [/absurity]. Don’t they investigate suspicious deaths in Japan?


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