jury

Ok. This is in very bad taste. But, I am hoping to improve my listening abilities by following the lurid trial of Oshio Manobu, an attractive if arrogant actor accused of providing ecstacy to a Ginza hostess and then abandoning her when she had a heart attack.

This story has many important angles: the first famous “lay judge” or jury trial since it was recently introduced in Japan, a story about drug panic in Japan (love the visual at the beginning where hundreds of pills are flying across the screen), its location in a super expensive Roppongi apartment possibly owned by the Peaches John bra shop’s female owner, and so on. Here’s yesterday’s summary in English.

Verdict is on Friday!

What makes the story mesmerizing for me, and probably for many Japanese female viewers, is the combination of Oshio’s bad character and his many hot looks. Is it wrong to think sexual thoughts of a bad person? Can you learn Japanese while feeling conflicted? (I have posted twice previously last December and August).

What do you think?!

A week full of scandals and bad behavior. Above is Oshio Manabu, an actor and pop singer, who fled the house of a woman with whom he did Ecstasy after she fell ill. He called his manager and left without calling for medical help. Later, she died. Now And now Manabu’s wife is divorcing him.

The second scandal involves “self-proclaimed professional surfer” Takaso Yuichi busted for amphetamine stuffed in his underwear who blamed his wife, popular actress Sakai Noriko. She fled the city but was arrested today after leaving her son at the home of her husband’s mistress.

Sadly I can’t find a photo of alleged surfer Takaso (Above is Takaso, thanks to an anonymous tipster, unfortunately not caught in surfer action), although I was charmed to hear that the government has pulled the wife’s movie promoting the new lay jury system in Japan. Apparently they don’t want a fictional “juror” who is a real life suspect.

The Japanese press is finding many warnings that Noripi was corrupted by her husband of ten years. Why she even got a tattoo last year: a clear signal of descent into depravity, no?

Early last year a tattoo was spotted on her left ankle, something not considered in keeping with her pure and innocent image. Showbiz sources say she had lost a lot of weight and was behaving erratically lately.