Kazuhide Uekusa - Sex Crimes

Sex Crimes

Today, he is mostly known as "Mirrorman" for being arrested on April 8, 2004 because he tried to peep under a high school girl's skirt using his hand mirror on the escalator of Shinagawa Station of East Japan Railway Company in Minato, Tokyo. He was dismissed from being a professor on May 7, 2004 because of the arrest, despite denying the charges. He held a news conference in Kasumigaseki on August 30, 2004, where he said "I was told I'd be able to go home quickly if I admitted my guilt, and so I admitted it. Clearly, this is a police frameup. I swear by heaven and earth I'm innocent".

His trial was opened at the Tokyo District Court on March 23, 2005 and the Chief Justice sentenced him to "Paying the fine of 500,000 yen (approx. £3,203 or $4,410) and confiscating his hand mirror". He insisted that it was an "unfair judgement" and showed intentions of appealing. The ruling was established however as he did not make the appeal by the deadline on April 6, 2005.

Additionally, there is a standing criminal record that required he pay the fine of 50,000 yen (approx £320 or $441) for lewd exposure and advances on a woman while on the JR Tōkaidō Main Line from Yokohama Station to Kawasaki Station at about 9:20 p.m. on January 30, 1998. He allegedly caressed the foot of a woman standing opposite him, and then proposed he masturbated for her in his trousers. The woman went to the train conductor and reported the incident. Uekusa was then escorted off the train by the Kanagawa Prefecture police.

A large number of pornographic videos, DVDs and images about voyeurism were discovered in Uekusa's house and his white BMW E36 of AC Schnitzer specifications in a domiciliary visit by the police. For these reasons during a trial, the Chief Justice stated that the "Defendant's sexual tastes are obvious". While still asserting that the charges upon his character are false, Uekusa is also trying to rebuild his reputation. One such attempt is characterised by his return to lecturing on economics.

In spite of the fact he declares himself not guilty of the previous offense (hand mirror case), he was arrested again at the Keikyū Kamata Station for molesting a high school girl in a Keihin Kyūko train which goes in a direction completely opposite his home on September 13, 2006, around 10:10 p.m.

He claims to be innocent. He says he was drunk when he was arrested, so he does not remember what happened that night. However, Nagoya University of Commerce & Business announced that they dismissed him from being a visiting professor on September 27, 2006.

He was indicted for chikan on October 4, 2006.

He was held at the Tokyo Detention Center from then until January 22, 2007, when he was released on bail of 6,000,000 yen. Tokyo District Court granted bail on January 19, but cancelled it the same day when the Tokyo District Prosecution Office objected. On January 22, the Tokyo High Court upheld the original Tokyo District Court ruling.

On October 16, 2007, Uekusa was sentenced to four months in prison by Presiding Judge Sho Kamisaka of the Tokyo District Court. He repeated his earlier denials, but fabric traces on his suit in addition to witness testimony were enough to convince the court that he had groped under the victim's skirt. In handing down the sentence, Kamisaka noted that "The court cannot anticipate that the accused will be rehabilitated" on his own recognizance.

Uekusa vowed to appeal, in a statement saying "the truth will always prevail."

In a talk with journalist Benjamin Fulford on June 19, 2008, he stated that he was arrested in the national policy investigation after he criticized an economic policy by Junichirō Koizumi and Heizō Takenaka on a television program.