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Voices of Victims


WRITTEN STATEMENT

By: Hiroko TOMIZAWA



  I was the victim in the Tottori Church assault incident, in which I was abducted and subsequently confined for about one year and three months. By this statement, I would describe the particulars of the incident as well as my first confinement experience.
 I was born on 15th April 1966 to Sukio and Mitsuko Tomizawa. I have 2-year-younger brother, Yasunari, and 3-year-younger sister, Yoko. I first joined the Unification Church in Osaka in October 1988 but left it in March 1990. I re-joined the church in Tottori Prefecture in November 1992.

  • 1. The first confinement in Yonago City
     On June 3rd 1994, upon returning from my work at a kindergarten, my family invited me for a dinner. I got on the family's car but, contrary to my expectation, they took me to a 3rd-floor room of an apartment called 'Sun City Yonago' in Yonago City. There, I was detained for almost 80 days until August 24th. The room was tightly locked with the entrance door chained and padlocked, very hard to open without the specific key. The glass door to the porch was also firmly shut with bars in and out. Pastor Katsunori Kaido showed up to talk to me for deprogramming. Around mid-August, I made up my mind of dying through fasting. Then, my father said, "Please listen to the pastor, and I shall unlock the door!" Amid the lax security, I could escape from the apartment early morning of August 24th.
  • Assault incident in the Tottori Church
     On 7th June 1997 at 2:00 PM, I asked my mother to come to the Tottori Church, where we met with a church member Tsurue Fukuda. Around 2:30, a group of people including my father and brother assaulted the church and abducted me into a wagon-type vehicle. On the way, my brother received a phone call from Mamoru Takazawa, pastor of the Kobe Makoto Church. My father gleefully reported to the pastor about the successful operation. As I had heard about a former Tottori Church member, Chikako Morimoto, who had been confined by the very pastor, I got convinced that this same pastor was involved in my abduction.
  • Confined in a hotel room
     The wagon car stopped at a hotel near the seashore and I was taken into its room. Staying at the hotel were my parents, younger brother and sister, unknown women and two private detectives. My father slept on futon laid in front of the entrance door. The next day, one of the detectives applied a special apparatus on the entrance so that it would not open easily. The same day, someone called 'Boss' came to inspect the situation. He called the two detectives as "Tsukamoto" and "Shirai" respectively.
  • Confined in an apartment
     On 9th June at about 10:30 PM, I was handcuffed in the hotel by one of the detectives. He applied its one ring on my arm and another on my father's. I was taken out of the hotel, put into the wagon car and brought to Osaka. The car stopped in front of an apartment, where an unknown stout man was waiting. I was escorted to the 10th-floor room No.1006. Coming out of the elevator towards the room's entrance, I was struck by so strange smell covering in the area that I could not open my mouth to scream "Help me!". The door was chained with two sets of padlocks, which would not be opened without a special key. The window was also tightly locked with iron wires binding the lock.
     On 9th June at about 10:30 PM, I was handcuffed in the hotel by one of the detectives. He applied its one ring on my arm and another on my father's. I was taken out of the hotel, put into the wagon car and brought to Osaka. The car stopped in front of an apartment, where an unknown stout man was waiting. I was escorted to the 10th-floor room No.1006. Coming out of the elevator towards the room's entrance, I was struck by so strange smell covering in the area that I could not open my mouth to scream "Help me!". The door was chained with two sets of padlocks, which would not be opened without a special key. The window was also tightly locked with iron wires binding the lock. On 10th June Pastor Takazawa showed up and spoke for about an hour. He rebuked me with such abusive languages like "June's slug!", "a rat in the attic" or "a dying cockroach". He came to the place virtually every day for the first week. Then, his visits became less frequent to every other day and finally once or twice a week. Whenever Pastor Takazawa came, he used to hit my back or knees very hard. Also, someone called Heizaburo Ohe came three days a week. A total of eight former church members were apparently directed to visit me. Pastor Takazawa admitted that he had seven people under his custody at the same time. At one point, he questioned me, saying "How many apartment keys do you think I have?"
     Since early July, my body suffered from psychopathic stomach ache, which would last throughout the confinement. Towards the end of July, I had inflammation of urinary bladder. Even then, Pastor Takazawa declared not to take me to a hospital.
     In July or August, my father was interrogated at the Tottori Police Station. Upon returning, father said, "Everything was all right!" I had anticipated my liberation, when I learned about my father's interrogation. But no words came from the police.
     After August, unless he had business trips, Pastor Takazawa visited me a couple of times per week, uttering words of criticism on the Unification Church doctrines, its founder and activities.
  • Confined at New Osaka City Corp
    In early September, we were to move to the 8th-floor room No.801 of the New Osaka City Corp. For the relocation, Pastor Takazawa's own son, Naoki Takazawa, drove a vehicle. On the entrance door, like the previous apartment, two padlocks were attached, thus hard to be opened without special keys retained by my father. The window lock was bound with iron wires, unable to be opened easily. When this apartment room would later be vacated, Pastor Takazawa boasted that he devised those apparatus.
     Either around September's end or early October, Pastor Takazawa spoke about his participation in a meeting among anti-UC ministers in Tokyo. According to him, one pastor, reading an article on Chuwa Shimbun, one of the Unification Church publications, about the Tottori incident, commented angrily; "Who on earth did such an act? This makes our activities more difficult! Leave such things to the parents!" Then, Pastor Takazawa dared to hit back, saying that he had carried it out. He was blamed by most of the participants excepting for Takashi Miyamura, who supported Takazawa, saying, "I would have done the same thing!"
     Around February 1989, Pastor Takazawa told me about confining one couple. He explained that he had not dealt with couples, but as it turned out viable, he started working on both husband and wife at the same time. Eventually, both husband and wife lost the UC faith. The husband, Mr. Tamura from Kochi Prefecture, was brought to my confinement site.
     Around 9th March 1998, Takashi Miyamura came to my confinement place with two former church members. Miyamura attacked the Unification Church with very harsh words. Looking no way out unless I would fake a departure from the church, I said, "OK. I will quit!"
  • Confinement continued even after quitting
     Even after my declared departure from the church, the confinement went on. Both Pastors Takazawa and Ohe bombarded with abuses against the Unification Church whenever they went. The manager of the Aoya Lutheran Church, Atsuyoshi Ojima, visited me once every ten days, pouring many rebukes about the Unification Church.
     Probably in March, Pastor Takazawa confided me and said that I was the 408th in the list of the deprogrammed by him! He disclosed that there were 40 some people whom he failed to deprogram owing to their escape or faked departure from the faith.
     Unclear about the timing, but Pastor Takazawa told me about his confinement of a female member of a religious group called 'Seien Kanki Kyo'. Takazawa said that, when she was about to be released, he threatened her by saying, "In case you return to the group, you shall be thrown into confinement once again!" Subsequently, she lodged a complaint to the Kobe Police, who reported to Takazawa that they did not take up the matter as they learned of his involvement in the case.
     In May 1998, for the first time during the confinement, I was allowed to visit a hospital called the Kojitsu Hospital, to which my parents and Ojima accompanied me as guards. The doctor pointed out my excessively fair skin, advising me to do more physical practice. I also underwent a few medical tests before going back to the apartment. The following day, I went to the hospital again under the surveillance of my parents and Ohe. Through the gastro-camera examination, I was pronounced to have gastroptosis and weak peristaltic motion.
     In June or July, Pastor Takazawa spoke about his communication with policeman by the name of Mr. Sugawa in Kobe. He also explained that as few people at the Tottori Police were informed about the Unification Church, he requested the Kobe Police to enlighten the police officers in Tottori.
     Around July, Pastor Takazawa boasted that he deprogrammed successfully 18 UC members through the confinement method in a previous year. He also said that he had already deprogrammed some 20 members that year.
     In early August, I went to the Kojitsu Hospital together with my parents and Pastor Takazawa. I was pronounced to be developing hernia.
     Around August 8th, Pastor Takazawa told me that my brother had been summoned several times by the police.
     On August 15th Pastor Takazawa explained to me that, "Because a criminal case ended up in a draw, the Unification Church is now lodging a civil case." I responded to him by saying "Their terrible behaviors deserve it!" and proposed to submit a written renunciation of faith. Then, Pastor Takazawa said, "You will do it, won't you?" in a satisfactory tone.
  • Rehabilitation at the Kobe Makoto Church
     On August 30th I was moved from the apartment to the Kobe Makoto Church, where I was to spend two-month rehabilitation on its second floor. My parents stayed on the ground-floor room next to the main hall. Several former UC members were undergoing the similar "rehabilitation" like me; two women in the female room and three men in the male room. At that time, a total of seven people were confined in the apartment. Two of them were a couple (not the Tamura pair mentioned before). This couple's child is being taken care of by their kin, disregarding the couple's desires. Adjacent to the Aoya Lutheran Church to which Ojima belongs, there was a house used for study sessions of the UC members' parents. While I was undergoing the rehabilitation, three groups of members' kin came to the Kobe Makoto Church for consultation about their children. They were taken care of by Pastor Takazawa, Yoshiko Takazawa, Vice Pastor Suzuki, Ojima as well as my parents.
     In early September, I weighed only 41 kg, down from my average 47 kg. In my worst moment during the confinement, I weighed only about 30 some kilograms.
  • Escape
    On September 15th at 2:25 PM, as other people went out and I happened to be left alone, I left a memo and escaped from the apartment.

end

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