A former Ohu University professor arrested on suspicion of leaking questions on a national dentistry examination to students last year has admitted acquiring some 10 questions prepared for the exam, police sources said Monday.
Kenji Kusunoki, 54, told investigators that Itsuo Ueda, 59, a professor at Health Sciences University of Hokkaido, leaked the questions to him and that he included those questions in a graduation exam given to Ohu students last February, the sources said.
Kusunoki quit Ohu, a private university in the city of Koriyama, Fukushima Prefecture, last September.
Ueda, who served on the national exam board between July 1998 and last June, was arrested Jan. 6 together with Kusunoki on suspicion of leaking exam information in violation of the Dental Practitioners Law.
Kusunoki had earlier denied the charges against him, maintaining he did not ask for any national exam questions. However, Ueda admitted to making some 10 "key words" available to Kusunoki around the fall of 1999, according to police.
Ueda also told investigators that he spoke with Kusunoki about the national exam after an oral hygiene academic conference in Fukuoka in November 1999, police said.
Investigators quoted Kusunoki as saying that he regrets having caused Ueda trouble. The two, both graduates of Osaka Dental University, are said to be close friends.
Police will continue investigating to determine when and how Kusunoki obtained the exam information from Ueda. Kusunoki's motive is suspected to be linked to an administrative policy of gauging professors' salaries according to student performance on the exams. According to investigations, Kusunoki included three oral hygiene questions scheduled to appear on the national exam last March in the exam given to final-year Ohu students in February.
Fourteen other questions on the Ohu graduation exam covered the same themes as those scheduled to be on the national exam.