Whoops…
Normally, a member of the yakuza losing a finger is not particularly noteworthy. After all, cutting off one’s finer to make amends for an action that has brought shame to one’s group is perhaps one of the most well know yakuza customs around. However, an 80-year-old man claiming to be a member of a Japanese organized crime group has lost one of his fingers and its not in the “traditional” way.
According to Tokyo Metropolitan Police, on July 2 at about 2:40 a.m., an 80-year-old man going by the name of Hansho Takahashi and claiming to be a top ranking member of the Inagawa-kai organized crime group, accidentally shot off his left pinky finger while cleaning a gun in his apartment in the Shibuya district of Tokyo.
After the incident, Takahashi went to a nearby convenience store where he borrowed the phone to call police and reportedly told them “I shot my hand with a handgun.”
Reports are saying that the senior gangster forgot that the gun had a bullet in the chamber and pulled the trigger resulting in the loss of one of his digits.
Takahashi was hospitalized after reporting the incident to the police and according to TBS News the suspect has admitted to owning the gun, a thus violating Japan’s Sword and Firearms Control Law. Takahashi has been arrested and police are investigating how he came into possession of the firearm.
Reports have yet to reveal if Takahashi managed to finish cleaning his gun.
