If you’re going to rob a convenience store, “please give me some money” probably isn’t the most intimidating opening line. Yet that was allegedly the strategy used by a 32-year-old man in Gunma, who police say held a knife to a convenience-store manager and asked for money in deliberately broken Japanese.
The suspect, 32-year-old Atsushi Goto, allegedly threatened a male store manager in his 50s with a knife at around 2:30 a.m. Tuesday at a convenience store in Oizumi. Despite his polite request for money, the plan quickly fell apart when the manager resisted, prompting Goto to flee empty-handed.
Suspect Admits to the Allegations
As with the robbery itself, Goto’s getaway was hardly a masterclass in criminal planning. Police say he was identified through forensic evidence collected at the scene and security camera footage. He later admitted to the allegations, saying he had tried to “pretend to be a foreigner” by asking for money in broken Japanese.
The Oizumi incident may not have been an isolated case. A day earlier, another convenience store about 20 kilometers away in Isesaki was robbed of ¥30,000 in cash. Police are investigating whether Goto was also involved in that incident, based on security camera footage and other evidence collected during the investigation.
Another Japanese Robber Who Pretended To Be Foreign
While police are still investigating the Isesaki robbery, Goto’s claim that he was pretending to be a foreigner has a curious precedent. A similar incident occurred in Aichi Prefecture in 2021, when a man wearing a ski cap, mask and leather jacket walked into a FamilyMart and pointed a knife at the manager, reportedly saying, “I’m Vietnamese. Money! Money!”
The attempted robbery was carried out by Yuto Watanabe, who, like Goto, allegedly thought claiming to be a foreigner could throw police off the scent. The two cases are separated by five years and hundreds of kilometers, yet are remarkably similar. Both suspects evidently believed that sounding foreign would make them difficult to identify, a strategy that clearly didn’t work.
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Updated On August 20, 2026
