Ryushi Namase (born 1949) was a Japanese businessman who operated the Namase Bar in Kabukicho, Tokyo during the 1980s.
Biography[]
Ryushi Namase was born in Tokyo, Japan in 1949, and he moved to the Kabukicho neighborhood in the 1980s to start his own business, the Namase Bar. He allegedly chased out the residents of the unit he purchased for his bar, earning him the enmity of Tachibana Real Estate. Namase and his family lived in the room next to the bar, and he paid protection money to the Jinsei-gumi family of the Tojo-kai yakuza clan for several years. In December 1988, however, Tachibana Real Estate attempted to force him out of his unit by hiring homeless men to take over the Hakua Building, and Namase refused to sell for weeks, leaving his wife and infant child in fear of the homeless men lurking outside. On 12 December 1988, former yakuza Kazuma Kiryu came to him to ask him about Tachibana Real Estate, and he was present when the company's enforcer Jun Oda showed up with his henchmen. Kiryu prevented Oda from laying a finger on Namse, but Oda threw ¥6 million in Namase's face and told him to call back later that night. Oda and his men then left, and, when Kiryu asked Namase if he intended to move out, Namase - who had earlier put up an act of standing up for the "little people" by refusing to sell - laughed and told Kiryu that those who had moved out when first asked were idiots, as his patience had earned him ¥6 million (¥2 million of which were taken from the Jinsei-gumi by Tachibana to pay back Namase for his months of tribute). Namase ultimately agreed to sell, and he and his family moved elsewhere.