Authorities issued an arrest warrant on 12 Nov 2025 for a 29-year-old Thai woman. She allegedly trafficked her 12-year-old daughter to Japan for sex work.
Japanese police rescued the girl after she was forced to serve about 60 clients over 33 days. The location? A private-room massage parlour in Tokyo’s Bunkyo Ward.
The girl was born in northern Thailand and lived with her younger sister and grandparents. She attended a state secondary school. Her mother had been working abroad in the sex industry during this period.
Abandoned in a Foreign Country
On 27 Jun 2025, mother and daughter flew from Thailand to Japan on a 15-day tourist visa. This was the girl’s first time in Japan.
The mother brought her daughter straight to a massage parlour in the Yushima district, near Ueno. The shop operator was Masayuki Hosono, 51.
The mother taught her daughter how to provide sexual services. “It ends when you make the customer ejaculate,” she told the girl.
They slept together in the building that first night. The mother vanished the next morning.
The girl couldn’t speak Japanese. She had no choice but to keep working at the parlour. She slept near the kitchen and received only a small food allowance.
Between June and July, she serviced around 60 customers. She earned over 627,000 yen—roughly SGD 5,345. The money went to a bank account linked to a family acquaintance of the mother.
The mother visited only once during those three months. The girl begged to go home via social media.
The Rescue
In September 2025, the girl walked into the Tokyo Regional Immigration Services Bureau in Minato Ward. Alone. She told officials she wanted to return to Thailand, reunite with her sister and grandparents, and go back to school.
Police raided the massage parlour. They arrested Hosono for employing an underage girl, violating the Labour Standards Act, and coercing her into sexual services.
The girl is now in protective custody as a trafficking victim. She’s reportedly the youngest foreign trafficking victim ever handled by the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department.
International Investigation
The mother was arrested in Taoyuan, Taiwan during a prostitution raid. She’s currently detained in New Taipei City. Taiwan’s immigration authorities said she arrived in September and overstayed her permit.
Local police detained her in a separate case, then handed her over to immigration.
She’s been linked to an international prostitution ring. Japanese authorities requested her transfer to Japan for questioning before deportation to Thailand for prosecution.
Police from Japan and Thailand will conduct a joint investigation into the suspected trafficking network. Investigators are examining communications between the massage parlour and the mother. They suspect an organisation connected them.
The parlour employed numerous other Thai women and offered sexual services to customers for extra fees. Japanese police are investigating whether brokers or organised groups brought the girl to Japan.
A senior investigator called the case “egregious.”
