In a fraud case involving the luxury watch sharing service “Tokematch,” it has been learned through interviews with investigative sources that Takazumi Fukuhara, 44, the former president of the operating company Neoreverse (based in Osaka City), who was arrested by the Metropolitan Police Department, applied for the issuance of a passport and began taking English conversation lessons about three months before leaving Japan for the United Arab Emirates (UAE), where he later went into hiding. The police believe that he had been planning to flee overseas from around that time.
Fukuhara and a former employee, Taishi Nakayama, 44, were arrested on the 26th on suspicion of fraud for allegedly posting false information on the company’s website between August and December 2023, claiming that “customers can receive a fixed monthly deposit fee by entrusting their watches,” and thereby defrauding a man in his 30s in Tokyo of 15 Rolex watches, worth approximately 18 million yen.
According to investigative sources, in November 2023 the company launched a campaign offering gift certificates to people who submitted watches for appraisal, stepping up efforts to recruit depositors. Meanwhile, Fukuhara reportedly told people involved with the company that he would “shut down the business in December,” and in early November he applied for a passport and enrolled in an English language school.
In January 2024, the company began converting the entrusted watches into cash in a concentrated manner, and Fukuhara left Japan on January 31. The Metropolitan Police believe that he collected and disposed of the watches with an overseas escape in mind.
It was also revealed that as of January 2024, when the company announced its dissolution, it had posted losses exceeding 500 million yen. Neoreverse was established in July 2020, and in August 2023 announced that the number of deposited watches had exceeded 1,500. However, its actual track record of lending out the watches was limited, and the Metropolitan Police are investigating the true state of the business.
On the 27th, the Metropolitan Police sent Fukuhara and Nakayama to the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office on suspicion of fraud.