Cops in Tokyo

[Rob Schwartz]

All-

wow, these stories really surprise me. I used to get pulled over a lot on my
bicycle in the late eighties and early nineties but my experience is that it
got less and less frequent and then stopped altogether. I haven't been
hassled by the cops in, literally, ten years.

My explanation would be twofold. Koenji is known as a place foreigners live
a possibly deal drugs. And, Iranians and other Middle Easterners tend to
live in the area. The racism is sad but if you are a little bit darker
skinned or have facial  hair i think these would be contributing factors.

One possible solution is to go to all your local kobans and register/tell
them about yourself. As you relate, once you start talking to the cops
everthing is fine. If the local Koenji omawari-san know who you are things
should get somewhat better.

How the situation improves,

Rob Schwartz


On 4/24/06, Peter Larson <peter_larson2000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> I guess I'd be surprised except this was an almost
> everyday occurence for me when I lived in Osaka. I
> used to have to ride my bike from Namba to Juso to see
> my then girlfriend (now wife) and would often be
> stopped as I was crossing the bridge over the
> Yodogawa. At one point, it got so bad that I was
> stopped every day for 10 days straight. Everytime they
> would ask to see my gaijin card, lecture me about the
> merits of registering my bike, etc, and everytime the
> same group of police would act as if they had never
> seen me before.
>
> Of course, I asked "why me?" and got the same empty
> excuse "many crimes have been committed by foreign
> people recently". One night I pointed out that most
> crimes in japan are committed by Japanese so why don't
> they just stop every single Japanese person crossing
> the bridge and leave me alone.
>
> At the tenth day, I couldn't take it any more and went
> into a screaming tirade about the maltreatment of
> foreigners on bicycles in Japan and told them to go
> and find some actual crime to harrass people over. My
> rant probably would have landed me in the back seat of
> a police car here in the USA (or worse!) but here they
> just tried to flag me away as quickly as possible and
> never stopped me again.
>
> It was this kind of thing that had me almost
> completely batty before I left Japan. It's unfortunate
> that this kind of activity exists in Japan, but I
> guess African-Americans and other minorities in US
> face the same treatment every day of their lives.
>
> Pete
>
>
> --- M Arnold <ma_iku at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I'm very curious to hear more about Kinema Club,
> > Nippon Connection, and any
> > of the other recent Japanese film activities. If
> > anyone has info, please
> > share!
> >
> > This message isn't really related to Japanese film,
> > but I wanted to post
> > here and see if others have had similar experiences
> > recently.
> >
> > As some of you know, I'm living in Tokyo now doing
> > Japanese film-related
> > research. Life in Tokyo is swell as always, but
> > since last December I've
> > been hassled by the police a number of times. Until
> > recently, in years of
> > studying and working in Japan, I had never once been
> > confronted by a
> > Japanese policeman. However since December, when
> > four cops on bikes and foot
> > surrounded me on a street next to the station in
> > Koenji, pretended that they
> > didn't realize I was white, and then asked for my
> > foreigner ID card and
> > wouldn't tell me why, cops have been stopping me on
> > the street every few
> > weeks. One time, when I was riding my bike along a
> > road near my apartment, a
> > patrol car passed me and suddenly swerved onto the
> > sidewalk several meters
> > in front of me. A cop jumped out, rushed over to
> > stop me, and said he wanted
> > to check my bike registration number, but after he
> > looked me over he backed
> > off without calling the number in.
> >
> > Another time I was riding my bike west on Ome Kaido
> > from Shinjuku when a cop
> > stepped out from the shadows, waving his flashlight.
> > He asked to search my
> > backpack with the excuse that a lot of people are
> > wandering around the area
> > these days with concealed weapons such as big
> > butcher knives. I told him I
> > was a graduate student researching Japanese film,
> > and he said he was very
> > happy that foreign students were taking such an
> > honest interest in Japanese
> > culture. He then asked me if I knew who Mishima
> > Yukio was, and told me I
> > need to read Mishima's "Kodogaku nyumon" (On Action)
> > before I leave the
> > country. (Just to be safe, I went and picked up a
> > copy at Book Off for 250
> > yen.)
> >
> > [Just a quick sidenote: Mishima's infamous "Yukoku"
> > is currently screening
> > at Kineka Omori.
> > http://www.cinemabox.com/schedule/omori/index.shtml]
> >
> > Among other incidents, the most ridiculous one
> > happened two weeks ago when I
> > was walking past the front of Koenji station in the
> > a.m. with a film
> > director, actress, and a salaryman acquaintance of
> > theirs. The actress went
> > off somewhere, and as the three of us walked past
> > the entrance to the
> > station, a short-ish, young looking guy in plain
> > clothes jumped off the
> > railing he was leaning against and, with eyes
> > darting back and forth, asked
> > me to show my foreigner registration card. He
> > flashed his badge for an
> > instant and said he was a "head patrol officer"
> > (junsacho) for Public
> > Security (Koan). I pulled out my ID while my two
> > companions stood there with
> > their mouths gaping open. "I don't believe this,"
> > they said. "It happens a
> > lot recently," I replied. Once the officer checked
> > my card he retreated back
> > to his position on the railing. Two or three other
> > normal looking people who
> > had been wandering around the station entrance
> > walked over to him
> > momentarily, said something, and then went back to
> > their positions as well.
> >
> > Walking away, my two middle-aged Japanese companions
> > couldn't believe what
> > had just happened. Once they collected their senses,
> > they decided such an
> > unconvincing Koan officer must be a fake--either
> > just a police otaku who
> > gets his kicks from pretending to be an undercover
> > cop, or worse, a yakuza
> > who hangs around the station extorting money from
> > gaijin who don't have
> > proper ID. (He certainly looked too wimpy to be a
> > "head patrol officer.") So
> > they decided to go to the nearby police box, and we
> > asked the regular cops
> > to check and make sure this secret police guy was
> > for real. The uniformed
> > cops walked back over to the head patrol officer
> > with us, asked for his ID,
> > and after chatting for a minute decided, sure
> > enough, he was the real thing.
> > Apparently the Koan folks don't have any contact
> > with the regular police, so
> > the police had no way of knowing there were Koan
> > patrolling their station.
> > We asked the regular cops why foreigners are getting
> > hassled around Koenji,
> > and as their faces got redder and redder, they told
> > us the usual
> > unconvincing excuses--crimes by foreigners are on
> > the rise, many foreigners
> > are overstaying their visas, etc. Immediately
> > afterwards, the director and I
> > walked to a nearby park for a cup of coffee and
> > noticed two other men
> > following us part of the way.
> >
> > It almost seems like a joke, but frankly I'm
> > starting to get a little
> > worried. I never used to pay much attention to the
> > police here, but now
> > whenever I pass one, I expect to get stopped. For a
> > moment after the Koenji
> > incident, I wondered if the cops might have me
> > blacklisted for hanging out
> > with dirty movie directors and radical film
> > researchers, or for taking
> > pictures in Yasukuni on August 15, or for watching
> > movies at the Shinjuku
> > Kokusai Gekijo. (The director who was with me in
> > Koenji thinks I'm being
> > targeted for having spent a little time with certain
> > 'left wing' directors
> > in recent months.)
> >
> > I wonder if anyone else has had problems recently.
> > I've heard from friends
> > and other Japanese film fans or researchers who have
> > had more trouble than
> > usual with the police in recent months (including
> > one member of this list).
> > I have no idea why the cops have gotten so dangerous
> > all of a sudden, but if
> > any non-Japanese list members are planning to wander
> > around western Tokyo,
> > you might want to make sure your bike is registered
> > and you're carrying a
> > copy of "Kodogaku nyumon" with your passport.
> >
> > Michael Arnold
> >
>
>
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