{"id":20094,"date":"2021-07-09T03:11:58","date_gmt":"2021-07-09T03:11:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/?p=20094"},"modified":"2026-04-23T17:46:27","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T20:46:27","slug":"japan-akimoto-could-face-five-year-prison-sentence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/japan-akimoto-could-face-five-year-prison-sentence","title":{"rendered":"Japan: Akimoto could face five-year prison sentence"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Tsukasa Akimoto, who is accused of attempting to bribe two people involved with the Chinese online gaming company 500.com, could face a five-year prison term.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<p>Japan.- Prosecutors want a five-year prison term for Tsukasa Akimoto, who was accused of bribing\u00a0<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/tokyo-court-2-former-500-com-officials\">a witness<\/a>\u00a0and former\u00a0<strong>500.com advisor with JPY20m in cash<\/strong> in relation to accusations that he himself had taken bribes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Prosecutors also want<strong> a JPY7.6m (US$69,000) fine<\/strong>, noting that Akimoto himself started to take bribes shortly after taking office as the state minister in charge of affairs related to integrated resorts.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Akimoto was accused of having accepted an\u00a0<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/kamori-given-10-month-suspended-sentence\">all-expenses-paid trip<\/a>\u00a0for him and his family to Rusutsu Villa, Hokkaido, from<strong>\u00a0the Chinese firm\u00a0<\/strong>when he has a member of the House of Representatives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Akimoto was released from jail on February 12 2020<\/strong>, but was arrested again in August 2020 and in September 2020.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tsukasa Akimoto, who is accused of attempting to bribe two people involved with the Chinese online gaming company 500.com, could face a five-year prison term.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":20113,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"Former Japanese state minister Tsukasa Akimoto faces a five-year prison term and a JPY7.6m fine for bribery and witness tampering related to the Chinese online gaming company 500.com and integrated resort (IR) development. Akimoto is accused of accepting an all-expenses-paid trip and cash bribes shortly after taking office as the state minister in charge of IR affairs. This prosecution underscores the significant regulatory and reputational risks within the iGaming and land-based casino sectors.","focusai_entities":"Tsukasa Akimoto, 500.com, House of Representatives","focusai_location":"Japan, Hokkaido, Rusutsu Villa","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.9), regulator (1.0), compliance_legal (1.0), operator_casino (0.9), investor_analyst (0.9), supplier_vendor (0.7), journalist_researcher (1.0)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"IR Licensing Impact?","query":"What are the broader implications of this prosecution for the timeline and integrity of Japan's integrated resort licensing process?"},{"label":"Governance Standards Influence?","query":"How might this case influence due diligence requirements and corporate governance standards for international gaming operators seeking market entry in regulated Asian jurisdictions?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[16338,439],"tags":[1758,229],"class_list":["post-20094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-east-asia-news","category-legal-news","tag-500-com","tag-gambling"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20094"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20094\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20130,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20094\/revisions\/20130"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}