The Aichi Prefectural Police arrested two former employees of Toyota on Tuesday on charges of defrauding the company out of ¥11.5 million ($78,000) by inflating expenses and placing questionable orders.
The two suspects, Takuo Arakawa, 47, from the city of Kasugai, Aichi Prefecture, and Yuta Nakamura, 38, who resides in Mie Prefecture, were previous employees of Toyota Coniq Pro, an advertising entity within the Toyota group.
Arakawa and Nakamura allegedly conspired to inflate costs when putting in orders for recruitment operations, causing Toyota Coniq Pro to issue roughly ¥180.4 million worth of promissory notes from September 2018 through the following month.
In addition, Aichi police assert that the duo received approximately ¥5.9 million in kickbacks for the practice from the company that it placed orders with.
According to Toyota Coniq Pro, Arakawa had allegedly engaged in similar illicit activities from 2012 to 2023. During this period, the suspect allegedly padded orders to the tune of around ¥100 million, and received roughly ¥63 million in kickbacks.
The company filed a criminal complaint with the prefectural police in October.
In February, the company disclosed that multiple employees, including Arakawa, had purportedly engaged in illicit financial transactions with contractors and other entities, culminating in an estimated loss of about ¥700 million.