Police arrested four former salesmen Thursday on suspicion of deceiving several individuals -- most of them elderly -- into signing contracts for unnecessary home renovations.
The Tokyo-based home-renovation companies that employed the men conducted sales in 34 prefectures, and investigators suspect the firms defrauded some 5,400 people out of more than 11.5 billion yen.
The four suspects were identified as Satoru Kamata, 28, Koji Hashikabe, 29, Shusaku Murauchi, 25, all former sales employees at Samunin East, which has since been renamed Riburo, and Kazuhiro Kuwabara, 26, who used to work for Samunin West. Kuwabara has basically owned up to the fraud, while the others maintain they did not lie when making their sales pitches, according to police.