Yu felt a rush of excitement as she walked into his bar for the first time – eager to meet the charming young host she’d been following for years online. On that cold January night last year, they chatted over champagne – the first of many meetings that would have Yu fast falling in love. Yu, 41, a clinician and divorced mother of two, soon began spending every spare minute with him at the bar in Tokyo’s main red-light district, dropping thousands of dollars on heavily marked-up alcohol.
Soon, he was treating her at restaurants and hookah bars, paying her special attention “over other girls,” she said. He talked about going to the places she wanted to visit, like Disneyland or Japan’s popular island destination Okinawa. This kind of special attention is why victims – some as young as 18 – often genuinely believe the hosts are their boyfriends, said Shiomura, the national assembly member.