The Metropolitan Police Department arrested Hogen Fukunaga, the founder of the foot-reading cult Honohana Sanpogyo, and 11 other senior cult members Tuesday on suspicion of fraud.
They are specifically suspected of swindling three housewives out of 22 million yen as "training fees" in 1994 and 1995.
The action culminates nearly four years of police investigations into the Fuji, Shizuoka Prefecture-based cult, which is believed to have defrauded at least 30,000 people out of more than 87 billion yen since it was officially recognized as a religious group by the Shizuoka Prefectural Government in March 1987.