Desperate for a liver transplant at UCLA Medical Center, the leader of Japan's third-largest organized crime group offered as much as $1 million to potential intermediaries to help him obtain a U.S. visa, according to several people who said they were solicited for assistance.
A private investigator, a business consultant and a lawyer told The Times that between 2001 and 2002 they were separately approached by representatives of Chihiro Inagawa, who told them that UCLA was willing to accept Inagawa as a patient.
But first, Inagawa needed help securing a visa because his gang affiliations prohibited him from being admitted to the United States, the three sources said. The sources, based in the U.S. and Japan, spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution by Japanese criminal gangs or of harming their own business interests.
Two said they personally were offered $1 million in Japanese yen if a visa was issued; the third said he was promised lucrative business deals with a prominent Japanese company.
Inagawa's gang, the Inagawa-kai, is involved in "drug and arms trafficking, extortion, investment frauds and money laundering," according to the International Crime Threat Assessment prepared by a working group of U.S. law enforcement and other governmental agencies in 2000.
The sources said they were asked to use their connections -- which included politicians and embassy contacts -- to help get the visa. One said he tried to help Inagawa by making phone calls and writing letters; the others said they didn't help.
According to one of the three sources, UCLA's top liver transplant surgeon, Dr. Ronald W. Busuttil, wrote a letter sent to U.S. officials saying that Inagawa needed a liver and that UCLA was willing to perform the transplant.
Another person, Oliver "Buck" Revell, a retired FBI senior executive, said he too made phone calls on Inagawa's behalf after being approached in 2001 by one of the man's representatives with whom Revell had a business relationship. Revell, by then a business and security consultant, said Inagawa was seeking surgeries at several U.S. hospitals and had not yet settled on UCLA.
Ultimately, however, Inagawa was not granted a visa to the U.S. because of his gang affiliations, the sources said.
Inagawa, who also went by the first name Yuko, later received a transplant in Australia and died in 2005 at the age of 64.
