Kobe Police Fear Wave After Lull

The police of Hyogo prefecture are concerned that a resurgence of crime will accompany the recovery from January’s earthquake, which flattened Kobe’s criminal activity along with much of the city.

In the month after the Jan. 17 earthquake that claimed more than 5,400 lives, the only category of crime in which an increase was recorded was thefts of motorcycles. Legal sales of motorcycles also skyrocketed during that period since commuter railways and damaged expressways were shut down and automobile and truck traffic overwhelmed streets that were open.

Police say the prefecture of 5.5 million people, in which the port city of Kobe is located, has not had a murder or an armed robbery in the more than two months since the quake. In 1994 there were 56 homicides and 81 armed robberies.

Although 83 cases of theft from shops were reported in the first month after the earthquake, that number was 232 fewer than the monthly average last year. The biggest heist was pulled off by a band of four men who traveled from Tokyo to raid a devastated department store of goods worth more than $1.4 million. They were arrested March 6 trying to sell the stolen goods in Tokyo.

Koji Fujiwara of prefectural police headquarters said authorities fear that crime, including gangland extortion, will increase as rehabilitation work progresses. Gangs have traditionally demanded between 1% and 3% of the value of construction contracts as mikajime , or protection money, Fujiwara said.

The national headquarters of Japan’s leading gang, the Yamaguchi-gumi, is in Kobe.