Couple nabbed for stealing to pay for tourist trip

Ginowan Police announced that a husband and wife from Tochigi Prefecture who were arrested for shoplifting in a large supermarket in Okinawa, were found to have stolen 370 items including electric appliances, while staying in Okinawa for 9 days.

The husband and wife have admitted to the charges saying they stole the items in order to save on their tour cost.

The arrested are 41-year-old self-employed Tomotaka Wada and his wife, 40-year-old Izumi from Ashikaga City in Tochigi prefecture,.

The arresting warrant states that the couple stole women’s underwear at a big supermarket in Ginowan City on Jan. 23.

Police investigators, questioning the couple after their arrest, discovered that the couple had stayed on Okinawa from Jan. 16 with their two cons aged 2 and 10 months, and stolen items such as clothes, and sent the loot in four-cardboard boxes to their home.

Investigators say that the wife put products in a shopping cart, and parked the cart at an inconspicuous place. Then the husband moved the products into a baby buggy, in which their infant son sat, and carted the goods out of the shop.

A security guard who followed the couple and grew suspicious, noted the husband and wife’s rent-a-car’s number and called police.

Ginowan Police officers then arrested the husband and wife close to Naha Airport about an hour before boarding on their scheduled flight back home.

According to police investigation, the husband and wife moved by a rent-a-car, and repeated the heist in nine big supermarkets in Ginowan, Okinawa and Naha City.

23:07 28 Mar , 2024