The Yomiuri Shimbun
A Nara prefectural police officer posted information about police investigations, including an announcement of a forthcoming crackdown on a group of motorcycle gangs, on a message board of Internet social networking site Mixi, The Yomiuri Shimbun has learned.
The officer, in his 20s, reportedly posted messages on the site, which has about 11 million registered members, during his working hours.
His superior officers verbally reprimanded him for his actions. Police sources quoted him as saying, "I was careless."
The officer began posting messages on the site from around August. He introduced himself in his profile section as a public servant working in the traffic division of a police station. He replaced some of the kanji identifying the police station where he is assigned with symbols, but it was still clear that he was a police officer working at a station in Nara Prefecture.
He reportedly also disclosed his gender, the area where he lives and his birth date.
According to sources, at 12:22 a.m. on Oct. 2 he posted a message saying, "A certain police station's special investigation task force finally obtained arrest warrants for a motorcycle gang group and will conduct a crackdown on them tomorrow, so I'm going to sleep soon because I have to go [to the police station] early tomorrow morning to provide backup."
In a message posted at 1:57 p.m. on Aug. 24, he wrote: "A rear-end accident occurred on National Highway Route 165!! The person in the car that was hit from behind was injured. The car that rear-ended the other one is reported to be on the run!! This is a hit-and-run...And there was a report that the suspect car was caught shortly after I left the police station in an unmarked patrol car. Damn, I missed out."
When the car's driver was arrested without a warrant, the officer wrote: "Now I'm at a district court seeking a warrant. It'll take some time to get it, so I'm waiting...Because of this, [I will lose] my consecutive days off...I'm crying."
All the messages he wrote described events that occurred, the sources said.
The policeman also referred in detail to accidents and described himself as "buried under a mountain of documents" in a post titled "On duty reports!?"
There were about 11.1 million registered Mixi members as of July 31. Only registered members can browse its message boards. Those who post messages can limit viewers of the messages to friends, friends and their friends or any Mixi member.
The officer's messages were accessible to all members, and the police received reports from some who read his messages, the sources said.
The officer was quoted by the police as saying, "I thought only my friends could read my posts."
(Nov. 9, 2007)
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