Japan's Elderly Crime Wave
The Documentary Podcast
BBC
4.3 • 2.7K Ratings
🗓️ 31 January 2019
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Elderly pensioners in Japan are committing petty crimes so that they can be sent to prison. One in five of all prisoners in Japan are now over 65. The number has quadrupled in the last two decades, a result it seems of rising elderly poverty and loneliness, as seniors become increasingly cut-off from their over-worked offspring. In jail old people at least get a bed, a routine and a hot meal, and for many, as Ed discovers, the outside world can seem like a threatening place. For the prison authorities it means an increasingly ageing population behind bars and the challenges of dealing with a range of geriatric health issues.
Produced and reported by Ed Butler.
(Image: Elderly Inmate "Kita-san" at Fuchu Prison, Tokyo. Credit: BBC)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Thanks for downloading this podcast of assignment from the BBC World Service. |
| 0:04.6 | You know you've picked one that really was a long time in the making. |
| 0:08.6 | It took me months to get permission from the Japanese prison service to hear firsthand some of the stories of the elderly |
| 0:15.3 | inmates who are incarcerated there, how they're managing, and why so many of them are now behind |
| 0:20.8 | bars. The reasons I discovered are really quite extraordinary. I hope you enjoy it. |
| 0:27.0 | Okay we're going to be a bit furtive now. We're going out into the store. |
| 0:35.0 | A small supermarket in Yokohama, Japan, an undercover surveillance operation is underway, led by one of Japan's best-known |
| 0:46.0 | store detectives, Mario Mocizuki. |
| 0:49.0 | The target today, elderly shoplifters. |
| 0:52.0 | I didn't know he, so fui-ki. elderly shoplifters. I'm going to be here. |
| 0:54.0 | So I step in the shop and I just feel that whole atmosphere |
| 1:00.0 | and then usually my instinct is right. |
| 1:05.0 | He can smell them before he even sees them. |
| 1:08.0 | With that, we cannot do our job. |
| 1:12.0 | Welcome to assignment on the BBC World Service. |
| 1:16.0 | I'm Ed Butler and I'm under cover today. |
| 1:18.0 | Well, sort of, because of this new and rather startling trend that's going on in Japan. |
| 1:23.7 | Thousands of elderly citizens, most with no previous record, |
| 1:28.0 | are suddenly out there committing crimes. |
| 1:30.8 | Today, nearly a fifth of Japan's prison population is over 60. Just think about that. |
| 1:36.8 | One fifth. In Britain or the US, for example, only one in 20 prisoners are elderly, |
| 1:42.8 | and most of them are in jail for crimes committed decades ago. |
... |
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