Dale Furutani - The Toyotomi Blades

Junko handed the stories to me. The longest were the L.A. Times pieces about the murder and my involvement in solving it. There was even a very small piece about the murder from The New York Times that I didn’t know of. Three stories that had nothing to do with my murder case were printed out. They were printed because they met the search criteria Junko had entered.

REPUTED ORGANIZED CRIME FIGURE ASSASSINATED

NEW YORK (AP)-George “Georgie L.” LaRusse, a reputed organized crime chief, was murdered last night in what police describe as one of the most spectacular gangland killings in years. The assailant entered LaRusse’s forty-fourth floor high-security apartment by removing the glass from a window. Police speculate that the murderer may have been lowered to the apartment from the roof of the building by accomplices.

LaRusse was both stabbed and thrown out of the open window. Ironically, he landed on the hood of a police car driving by the building. Two officers in the car were unhurt. Police are currently uncertain of the motive for the assassination, but did say LaRusse had recently been involved in territorial disputes over crime activities in Harlem.

In a bizarre twist to the case, an ancient Japanese samurai sword was stolen from the apartment by the assassin. The sword was not used in the attack on LaRusse. Police found the knife used in the assassination still in the victim’s body. According to Patricia King, manager of Derek Stacy Decorating, the company that decorated LaRusse’s apartment, the sword is considered quite valuable. “It was purchased at auction for $11,000 and should be worth quite a bit more now. Mr. LaRusse insisted on the finest decor for his apartment, although he was not a collector or art connoisseur himself. The sword was a fine example of 17th-century Japanese swordmaking, by the sword-smith Kannemori.” What connection, if any, the sword theft had to the assassination is still being investigated by the police.

LaRusse’s career was free of convictions, despite his well-known association with organized crime and organized crime figures. LaRusse was connected to the protection racket, prostitution and the numbers racket. He was indicted once in 1979 in an assault case, but escaped conviction when both the victim and the only witness to the assault recanted their grand jury testimony at the trial. Prosecutors later hoped to secure an indictment against LaRusse for intimidating the witnesses, but had to abandon prosecution when the witnesses refused to cooperate.

THEFT OF RARE SWORD

ROTTERDAM (REUTERS)-A rare Japanese sword was stolen yesterday from the Dutch Shipping Museum. The sword was part of an exhibit on the Dutch presence in Nagasaki, Japan, at the beginning of the 17th century. Dutch police describe the sword as being made by the swordsmith Kannemori and quite valuable.

“I don’t know why someone would steal such a distinctive sword,” Wim Brock, the museum’s director, said. “It will be murder to sell.”

Authorities believe the theft may be an inside job because there was no evidence of forcible entry and the alarm system was operative. Although the investigation continues, police admit that they have no suspects at this time.

STUDENT IN BIZARRE ‘SEX’ DEATH

TOKYO (REUTERS)-A student suspected of stealing a rare 17th-century samurai sword from the Japan National Museum was found dead yesterday under bizarre circumstances. Yasuo Ishibashi, 19, was found strangled in a Japanese “love motel,” and Tokyo police are uncertain how to characterize the death.

“It could be a suicide because of the trouble Mr. Ishibashi was in or it could be an accident involving strangulation for sexual pleasure. It could even be murder,” commented Tokyo police inspector H. Hayase. “Right now, it’s difficult to comment because of the strange circumstances.”

Hayase said there was no suicide note and that Ishibashi was found hanging in front of a television showing pornographic movies. “There are actually some people who derive sexual pleasure from strangulation,” commented Hayase, “and this may just be a bizarre accident involving this kind of practice.”

Ishibashi’s family said he was under considerable pressure because he was a suspect in the theft of a rare 17th-century samurai sword that was stolen from the Japan National Museum. The family said he was not suicidal and had no known proclivities for the kind of sexual perversion suggested by the police.

The sword, made by master swordsmith Kannemori, is considered a national treasure by the Japanese. The sword dates from the early 17th century, an era in Japanese history made popular by the novel and television show, Shogun. Ishibashi was working as a student volunteer at the museum and museum officials claim Ishibashi was the only one with access to this sword when it disappeared.

Ishibashi attended prestigious Waseda University in Tokyo. He took additional classes in Japanese history and martial arts at All Japan University, also in Tokyo.

“This is strange,” I commented. “There seems to be an epidemic of deaths and sword thefts, and all are swords made by the same swordsmith. That’s a peculiar connection.”

Junko took the news stories from me and read them. She looked at me and shrugged. “Weird,” she said.

Junko was right about the promotional piece taking more than an hour to organize and shoot. There was much shuffling around and a couple of false starts before we finally walked on the set and shot the promo. As befit the stars of the show, Nagahara-san and Yukiko-chan didn’t show up on the set until we were actually ready to shoot.

The two hosts of the program were certainly an odd couple. Nagahara-san was a man in his late fifties with a somber face covered with age spots and a large mole on his upper lip. It occurred to me that in the U.S. a mole of that size would be removed for cosmetic purposes by most people, not just those in show business. His salt-and-pepper hair was closely cropped and his suit was crumpled. He looked like a local shopkeeper instead of a television personality, but maybe that was his appeal to Japanese audiences. Aside from “Hello,” his English was almost nonexistent, and Junko translated his laconic greetings for me.

Yukiko-chan was a young woman who was probably in her midtwenties. Chan added to the end of a name is a diminutive usually reserved for children and women. Applied to women, it shows a linguistic mind-set that must drive Japanese feminists to despair. Yukiko-chan corrected me when I tried to call her Yukiko-san, however. She liked the chan honorific.

Her English was also poor, and when she saw me, she started speaking Japanese. I guess if you have a Japanese face, some people think you must speak Japanese. It’s the reverse of what I experience in the U.S., where if you have an Asian face, some people don’t think you can speak proper English. Like many Asian-Americans, I’ve actually been complimented on how well I speak English. When Yukiko-chan started in with Japanese, I gave her the kind of blank stare I usually reserve for people in the U.S. who think they have to speak pidgin English to me, only this time the stare was genuine. Junko gently inserted herself to translate.

Yukiko had a face that looked like a teenager’s, and she was dressed in a short pink frilly dress that was styled like something the young Shirley Temple would have worn. Her hair was cut short and shaped to frame her tiny face, and when she talked she revealed crooked teeth. Japanese TV audiences seem to find crooked teeth cute. In different clothes Yukiko would look her age, but apparently she wanted to cultivate a little girl look. Her on-camera personality could only be described as perky, but away from the lens she seemed a bit petulant.