Japan Thugs Beware

By Howard G. Chua-Eoan

The five-story structure was painted a dark shade of green, but to the people of Ebitsuka it was ominously known as the burakku biru, the black building. Ebitsuka wanted nothing to do with the place or with those who called it headquarters. Across the street, the citizens erected a two-level shack and videotaped everyone who came in and out, men in flashy suits, dark glasses and short-cropped hair, with hints of multicolored tattoos snaking out on forearms.

In Japan, this is the unmistakable mobsterish getup of the yakuza, the country's version of the Mafia. In Ebitsuka, a neighborhood in the city of Hamamatsu (pop. 514,000), about 130 miles southwest of Tokyo, the gangsters did not take kindly to the scrutiny, often loudly threatening the surveillance teams; one once approached the shack with a sword. Undaunted, the townsfolk gathered outside the burakku biru to chant "Get out! Seek an honorable life!"

The yakuza, who trace their origins to unemployed 17th century samurai, are not accustomed to such outspoken opposition. Numbering perhaps 86,000 and divided among 3,100 clans, they account for a third of those accused of murder and 60% of those arrested for blackmail. But towns faced with an intruding clan usually resign themselves to coexistence.

Not the 970 families who live in Ebitsuka. The struggle began in 1985, when the Ichiriki Ikka (the One-Power Family) set up headquarters in the green building. Besides monitoring visitors, the residents of Ebitsuka sent 1,500 protest postcards to Tetsuya Aono, chief of the Ichiriki Ikka, demanding that he and his cohort of 110 leave town. Shop owners refused to sell goods to the yakuza. After Ebitsuka lodged a lawsuit against Aono, says Eiichiro Mizuno, a local mechanic, "the gangsters began showing their fangs." A young mobster screamed obscenities at Mizuno and smashed the windows of his house. Later, a gang member strode up to Ebitsuka's lawyer, Yoshihiro Mitsui, in a coffee shop and stabbed him, puncturing his lung. Another activist was slashed in the throat.

Some Ebitsuka residents lost heart and abandoned the anti-yakuza campaign. Others saw the problem as too big for one town to solve and argued for detente. But most pressed on with the harassment campaign. Said Haruji Toyoda, 61, a leader of the movement: "You had to overcome fear. If not, people would have said that we too lost out to violence."

The gangster attacks attracted national media attention. The local police force of eight was augmented by 300 officers from other communities. Hamamatsu set up a special 120-man police task force to guard against illegal activities by gangsters. Gradually, about half the clan's members were put in jail or placed under detention.

Last month Gang Lord Aono agreed to an out-of-court settlement in which the Ichiriki Ikka abandoned the burakku biru. Said Toyoda: "They did not want to stir up trouble for gangsters elsewhere." Happy residents gathered outside the hated building and removed the anti-yakuza banners. Amid the celebration, a few expressed reservations. Said Mizuno: "We don't know where the gang is going next." But wherever the yakuza go, they are not likely to forget Ebitsuka.

With reporting by Kumiko Makihara/Hamamatsu