Unlicensed Healer in Oshima Referred to Prosecutors — What the 'Warming Technique' Actually Was Remains Unidentified

■ Eleven Days After the Case Broke, a Referral to Prosecutors

As previously reported on the 14th, the 56-year-old operator of "Seijutei," a facility in the Oshima district, was said to have performed unlicensed exogenous-technique treatments — a so-called "warming technique" — on elderly clients. It emerged on the 14th that a 78-year-old customer had suffered a minor burn to her left arm during a treatment in September and had been hospitalized, prompting a police investigation on suspicion of unlicensed use. Sources confirmed on the 25th that police referred the operator to prosecutors on the 24th on that same suspicion. Such a referral is a standard procedural step regardless of whether the suspect admits or denies the allegation; whether to indict is now up to prosecutors.

■ "What Was Actually Used" Remains Unknown

As previously reported, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry's Exogenous Technique Promotion Division could not confirm any license registration for the operator, but even with the investigation complete, what the treatment actually involved was never clarified. An investigative source said, "The operator has consistently maintained that he 'warmed clients with heat from his palms,' but the physical evidence at the scene gave us no way to determine whether that was an exogenous technique or whether he was concealing some kind of heating device." A ministry official likewise reiterated, "A licensed practitioner is obligated to register the equipment used under the applicable category. In this case, we could confirm neither a category nor a registration, and in the end — honestly — we were simply never able to determine what was used."

■ A Client: "I Trusted Him, So I Never Doubted"

The previously reported 78-year-old client told this paper, "His hands really were warm. Until I got the burn, it never once occurred to me that anything was wrong." She said she had been paying a monthly fee of 80,000 yen for about a year and a half. "Maybe it was only my imagination that my lower back felt better. Even so, I still want to know what that warmth actually was."

■ Consumer Affairs Study Group Adds Elderly-Targeted Unlicensed Treatment as a Topic

As previously reported, the Consumer Affairs Agency's study group (chaired by Ritsuko Fukazawa) had indicated it would add the reality of unlicensed treatment targeting the elderly to its agenda. The group's secretariat commented on the 25th, "Unlike the hands-on 'experience classes' we've seen before, the Seijutei case is the first we're treating as involving sustained treatment of elderly bodies with a confirmed actual health harm. The fact that its reality was never clarified, even after a referral to prosecutors, shows just how difficult this type of problem is."

■ TDA Repeats Its Standing View: "Conditions Remain Unexplained"

Asked about the referral at its regular briefing on the 25th, the TDA said, "Our previously stated view is unchanged: the conditions under which both permeation sensitivity and exogenous techniques occur, or can be reproduced, remain unexplained, and there is no scientific basis for an unlicensed person applying their own judgment to treatment of the body." The question of whether Seijutei actually used some kind of technique, or simply a physical device, remains unanswered even after this referral.

■ The Facility, Now Effectively Closed

Seijutei has reportedly remained effectively shut down since the case first came to light. A neighbor said, "The sign out front is still up, but I haven't seen anyone coming or going. It might just end without anyone really knowing what happened." The operator himself could not be reached for comment. What actually took place at Seijutei remains, even after the referral to prosecutors, unresolved.