A Japanese man accused of conspiring with a woman to force a then 12-year-old Thai girl into sex work at a Tokyo massage parlour he operated has denied the charges.
“I did not know she was underage,” Masayuki Hosono, 52, told the Tokyo District Court during the first hearing of his criminal trial on Monday.
His defence counsel also argued that he had been deceived about the girl’s age by the woman, Punsiripanya Phakhaphon, 38, a Thai national who managed the private-room massage parlour in Tokyo’s Yushima district.
Punsiripanya was arrested on February 16 on suspicion of violating the immigration control law by arranging for a foreign national to engage in illegal work.
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She had already been arrested in January for allegedly acting against the child welfare law and was subsequently indicted.
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