April 14, 2000, Friday Lawmakers In Japan Hear Grim Sex Case By CALVIN SIMS Source: The New York Times Section: Foreign Desk 795 words
Abstract Japanese lawmaker Yoshihide Sakaue, senior member of Parliament's Special Committee on Juvenile Issues, peppers government authorities with question about how they had dealt with accusations that Japan's leading talent agent, Johnny Kitagawa, had sexually abused teenage boys he was grooming for stardom; case reviewed (M)
Japan's star-maker accused of sexually abusing boys Justin McCurry, Kobe Observer
Sunday April 23, 2000
The boss of Japan's biggest talent agency, a man who spent 37 years plucking teenagers from obscurity, is at the centre of a scandal that could bring his empire down.
Johnny Kitagawa, 68, has been accused of sexually abusing many of his young male charges, including one aged 12. Police, abandoning a traditional reluctance to pursue such cases, have announced an investigation.
Alumni of Johnny's Jimusho (Johnny's Office), are everywhere on Japanese TV. A survey showed they appeared in 80 shows and commercials in one year alone. At the peak of the boy band boom in 1995, Johnny's, by then known popularly as the 'Pretty Man Factory', registered earnings of 2.9 billion yen (£17 million). Since Kitagawa's first success with a boy band, the Four Leaves, in 1963, he has produced a steady stream of dancers, singers and actors, many now household names in Japan.
The allegations surfaced last October in Shukan Bunshun, a respected weekly magazine.
Kitagawa vehemently denied them, and launched a libel suit. His lawyer says he is the victim of rumours spread by former clients who lacked the talent to succeed.
The magazine refuses to back down. It has made further accusations in graphic weekly instalments. It claims to have spoken to 12 teenage boys who took part in the agency's residential training programme. They tell of sexual abuse, including rape, allegedly carried out by Kitagawa.