On March 17th, police arrested infamous celebrity Sakaguchi Anri on charges of petty theft for stealing a 300 yen (around 2 USD) sandwich from a convenience store. Despite the pettiness of the crime, which Sakaguchi later said she committed for the thrills, authorities held her for over a week.
This arrest is another notch in Sakaguchi’s long belt of chaotic behavior. However, it’s also led to a swirl of online speculation about why police would hold someone for so long over so minor a crime – especially when much larger crimes in Japan get swept under the rug.
Sakaguchi Anri’s tumultuous life
Sakaguchi Anri came into the public eye thanks to her mother, Sakaguchi Ryoko, a late 70s television drama star. By the time that Ryoko died in 2013, Anri, who was only 22 at the time, had already followed in her mother’s footsteps, working as a variety show talent in the entertainment industry.
Observers say that her mother’s death sent her into a mental health spiral. By Anri’s own account, her inheritance was mostly burned through for costly funeral and burial arrangements, dropping her from the heights of society into financial precarity. At one point, she entered the adult video (AV) industry to make ends meet.
From there, her life became a series of public misadventures. She garnered a reputation for frequent, outrageous, attention-seeking social media outbursts.
In 2017, she was arrested on suspicion of extorting her partner at the time, although she was never charged. Later that year, she announced she was leaving the entertainment industry, AV included. Two years later, in 2019, she released a tell-all autobiography.
When she married a non-celebrity in 2022 after a few years of relative stability, people thought she may have finally gotten her act together. Not long after, both she and her husband took to social media with accusations, including claims of domestic violence. The relationship devolved into a public mudslinging spectacle.
In the last four years, she’s been working in nightclubs and bars. It seemed she was doing alright, with some of her most recent coworkers reporting that she received preferential treatment from the owners. With the latest arrest, this chapter of her life also seems to have drawn to a chaotic close.
Sakaguchi’s extended detention
While Sakaguchi Anri’s chaotic behavior has always drawn headlines, her extended confinement after the arrest was the real mystery that kept the latest story in the news.
Police can generally hold someone for up to 23 days on a single charge. Japanese police often re-arrest people on other charges to reset the clock and keep them longer. Suffice to say, being held in police custody over 300 yen of petty larceny is far outside legal norms, even in Japan’s justice system.
Lawyer and former member of the House of Representatives Wakasa Masaru commented, “If your identification is in order, even if you get arrested, you’ll be released more often than not.”
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“If the suspect doesn’t have an address, or has no money, or if the police think the suspect will do it again, even if they confess, then the police might detain them,” he added. “Conversely, if their identity is established, they have money, and there are no problems after the arrest, more often than not, the suspect will get off with a fine or the prosecutor will decide to leave the charge on file and let the suspect go.”
Combini police state
Sakaguchi’s infamous life story, combined with the unusual length of her detainment, made fertile ground for speculation on the exact details of her arrest. Some suspected that the 300 yen sandwich was just a “headline” charge.
However, some media insiders saw the police’s behavior as par for the course when they arrest high-profile figures. One television reporter spoke anonymously to the magazine Friday Digital, saying,
“When the police arrest a famous person, even if it’s a minor offense, the information will leak to the media. When the information is public, it becomes a case of ‘making an example’ as a way to deter crime. Speaking frankly, the police want to show they are doing their job and, in some sense, are leveraging the limelight. Sakaguchi makes an ideal ‘prey’ for this kind of public punishment. Since these stories bring the numbers, the media is happy to report on them.”
The reporter gave an example of this kind of police behavior, noting that it’s not limited to celebrities.
“The police are also especially strict when top figures in news organizations commit crimes, since the information will make it to the media. Not too long ago, a chief officer of a TV news station got arrested for riding his bicycle drunk, and the police released his full name. Sure, drunk driving is bad, but it was a bicycle, not a car, and he didn’t even cause an accident. If it were a random person, the police would never release a name.
“They were talking about this guy being the next president of the company, but his career completely ended. That said, it’s his own fault.”
The anonymous reporter didn’t name names, but is most likely referring to Katsuta Shinji, a television news executive who was arrested on the described charges and subsequently named in July of last year.
This kind of “example arrest” tactic aligns with the Japanese police force’s aggressive strategies in recent years, especially around crimes committed in convenience stores.
In 2021 and 2022, police arrested people for the truly small-ball scam of taking more self-serve coffee than they paid for in a convenience store. The damages of one unauthorized upsize amount to around 70 yen (roughly 50 US cents), so even with repeated offenses, they were hardly breaking the bank. But for Japanese police, it’s a matter of principle, and both men lost their jobs after their coffee crimes came to light.
From this perspective, Sakaguchi Anri’s extended confinement after stealing a sandwich was a perfect storm of policing. Cops aggressively enforced the razor-thin margins of the convenience stores that hold up a huge segment of Japan’s economy. At the same time, they made an example of a problematic celebrity suspect.
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Life under the microscope of social media
It seems Sakaguchi has since been released from police custody. She made an appearance on March 29th on JUNYA Channel, where she explained that she had money – she just committed minor theft to “experience the thrill of it.”
Like many of Sakaguchi’s escapades, her latest arrest became a social media spectacle. Some jeered at her fall from grace to the point that she’s stealing 300 yen sandwiches. Some expressed concern for her mental health and wondered where it all went wrong.
Others noted the inequities in Japan’s justice system. They called out how Sakaguchi gets arrested for 300 yen, but the LDP officials who siphoned huge amounts of money tax-free into a slush fund walked free.
For Sakaguchi herself, it was another moment where everyone was talking about her.
In that sense, this latest arrest and extended detention hold a mirror up to her entire life. She’s a person who undoubtedly makes mistakes, and those are her consequences to bear. But those consequences get magnified by her status in the public eye – a status she inherited rather than necessarily chose – turning her misdeeds into discourse.
There are many people in Japan and anywhere who lead tumultuous, toxic lives. But because Sakaguchi inherited fame, her life is a perpetual spectacle. Onlookers speculate and discuss. But perhaps, if no one was watching, she could have just paid back the damages of her ultimately minor crime and gone on with her life.
Instead, she was confined for ten days, and everybody had something to say about it.
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Sources
「なぜ？」坂口杏里 “300円サンドイッチ“万引きで「勾留＆大々的報道」のワケ Friday Digital
Wakasa Masaru comments source – 坂口杏里「万引き300円で長期勾留」の謎…弁護士は「店員とトラブルの可能性も」と指摘 SmartFLASH
Sakaguchi Anri’s troubled past and social media opinions source – 坂口杏里に必要なのは処罰より“保護”か？ 300円サンドイッチ万引で逮捕…呆れる声から心配する声まで Nikkan Gendai
Katsuta Shinji drunk biking source – テレビ金沢の取締役、自転車の酒気帯び運転の疑いで摘発 The Sankei Shinbun
《もう悪いことは二度としない…》坂口杏里が300円サンド万引きで釈放後に語った「保育、介護系の仕事への憧れ」と、持ち続けていた「子供が欲しい」の夢. News Post Seven
