Japanese authorities seeking to recover 46.3 million yen ($362,000) of pandemic aid that was mistakenly sent to one person are facing a major problem. He apparently gambled it all away.
The 24-year-old unemployed man, from Abu, a town in Japan’s western Yamaguchi prefecture, allegedly spent all the cash at overseas casino sites, according to an NHK report. He was arrested Wednesday on suspicion of computer fraud, the broadcaster said.
The mistake occurred in April when the city was arranging to allocate 100,000 yen in Covid relief to 463 low-income households. Instead, all the cash was transferred to the first name on the list, NHK reported. The man said he couldn’t return the money but was willing to pay for his troubles, the report said.
It’s not the first time pandemic aid has attracted controversy in Japan. A plan by Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s government to provide Covid coupons to families attracted criticism last year for costing nearly $1 billion.
Abu’s blunder attracted discussion on social media. “Since it looks like the money’s not going to be returned, they just have to take the loss and treat it like a publicity stunt for the town’s name,” a Twitter user wrote.
(c) 2022, Bloomberg · Low De Wei, Yasutaka Tamura
