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The story
Kura Sushi’s Chiikawa collaboration prizes became a hot topic the moment they went on sale, getting resold at absurdly inflated prices on flea-market apps. In the middle of the frenzy, it came to light that staff at some stores had been embezzling the prizes and keeping them for themselves. Because embezzlement, like theft, can be prosecuted without a complaint from the victim, thread posters repeatedly pointed out that if police move in earnest, Kura Sushi itself won’t be able to stay uninvolved. While some blame Kura Sushi’s lax management, opinions were split over creator Nagano’s continued silence on the matter, and the debate broadened into whether responsibility should fall mainly on the individual staff members who embezzled or on the company that let it slide.
What people said
once the police start moving, Kura Sushi is done for
But if they don't hunt down a culprit here, they'll just get flamed even harder
And the number of employees skimming off the top is apparently huge, so if a bunch get cut loose at once some stores might collapse entirely and the whole business could take a hit — they're cooked no matter what they do
just for show
We're suing every single one of you who caused this much damage — do you have any idea how much this cost?
If they just look the other way on the Mercari mess that's already done them serious damage, they're completely finished as a company
This is a violation of the Premiums and Representations Act against customers to begin with
If they don't investigate properly, they're seriously done
once the police get serious, it's checkout time
What about Yahoo Flea Market and Rakuma (rival resale apps) — are those okay?
for reference, the odds of winning the lottery jackpot are 1 in 20 million
Lmao
assuming everything really was in there, how much would it cost to actually eat your way through it properly?
they obviously can't afford to fire the manager, let alone the part-timer
Wouldn't they at least do a pay cut or slash bonuses?
Kura only pulls in 3 billion yen in net profit despite its size
if they start seriously paying out damages and everything, they might genuinely go under
their finances are way too weak
it's an abnormal number
Sounds like the people who demand anti-war statements from artists
Nagano's got that smug look on, watching from a safe distance
There's zero damage to her at all
with this many bad incidents piling up, some fans might drift away, but that's probably just a rounding error to her
why are the victims only hammering Kura?
if Kura just ignores it, that's game over
can nobody think about which side is actually forced to act here?
So the rights holder has to manage Kura Sushi's part-timers too now? Tough gig
There was actual suspicion of misuse and the creator's side stayed completely silent about it though…
It's rare, so everyone wants it, and because everyone wants it, the price shoots up
are you saying Kura should make every single item to order and sell it that way?
the embezzler deserves to be strung up, but there's nothing to be done about resellers who got the goods through legitimate means
People demanding Mercari crack down on these listings are basically turning into complainers themselves, but in their own heads they think they're doing the righteous thing
even people who normally say complainers are the problem lose it the second it's Chiikawa — I guess when it's something you love, your judgment goes out the window
if you can't even properly train or manage your own staff, this is what happens
Does it really become 'Kura Sushi's fault' in a case like this?
Self-Defense Force members get caught committing crimes every few days, but nobody says the SDF itself is at fault…
it's the individual member who committed the crime who's at fault, plain and simple
They're diverting stuff from inside the store, not outside it, so of course it comes down to the store's management
To begin with, people had already been saying prizes were being skimmed before, but Kura Sushi tried to brush it off with 'that's just bad luck'
this time they tried the same excuse, but for some reason it got dealt with and exposed — so there's a real argument that Kura's own past negligence is what invited this
the only way to turn this around now is to dig up every employee who was skimming and string them all up
and even after all this, there are still fanboy types (みいちゃん, slang for a blindly devoted fan) out there defending Kura, lol
They flatly stated they'd properly verified the odds
they were seriously planning to skate by on just that
Every time they were suspected of pulling this before, they dodged it with 'it's random~' and 'we manage it properly~' — so this time being an exception is telling
this isn't just lawsuit risk, it's a guaranteed prison sentence — can't wait to see how this plays out
Wait, didn't prison-with-labor sentences get abolished and merged with imprisonment-without-labor? Isn't it called a 'custodial sentence' (拘禁刑, kōkinkei) now?
Background and key points of this story
Embezzlement counts as occupational embezzlement, and like theft, it can be prosecuted without a complaint from the victim. Also, under the criminal code reform that took effect in June 2025, prison-with-labor and imprisonment-without-labor were merged into a single ‘custodial imprisonment’ sentence — the shift in sentencing terminology mentioned in the thread reflects this change. The Premiums and Representations Act sets an upper limit on the value of prizes relative to a customer’s purchase amount, so if prizes were being fraudulently siphoned off internally, the company could also be held accountable for its management from a legal-compliance standpoint. Where the thread split was over whether to place responsibility on Kura Sushi’s management structure as a company, or limit it to the individual staff members who committed the fraud — with the Self-Defense Force’s past scandals brought up for comparison. That said, reselling merchandise obtained legitimately through official raffles or purchases isn’t automatically illegal under the Premiums and Representations Act or criminal law, and care should be taken not to conflate that with goods that leaked out through embezzlement.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Live News general channel) thread “Kura Sushi x Chiikawa collab merch prices go through the roof, staffer who embezzled and hoarded it wins big lolololol.”
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