During the 1957 Osaka Incident, the police pressed the true perpetrators of the vote solicitation in the 1957 Osaka by-election to falsely testify against Ikeda, who was arrested.
Another men’s division member had engaged in door-to-door solicitation of votes, which was also against Japanese election laws. He, too, was arrested and threatened by the police, who pressed him to falsely testify that he had acted under instructions from Shin’ichi Yamamoto.
Knowing that the man’s son had a school trip coming up and the boy was waiting anxiously for his father’s return, the detective said to him: “They tell us your eldest son is going on a school trip. Why don’t you just tell us what you know and go home? If you continue to be so stubborn, you could stay here for a long time. Why don’t you just give in and confess? I’ll talk to your son’s teacher and arrange it so that you’ll only have to pay half of your son’s expenses for the trip. I’ll even contribute 1,000 yen towards it out of my own pocket. “When the member still insisted that he hadn’t received any instructions from Chief of Staff Yamamoto, the detective stepped up his attack: “Don’t you feel sorry for your son? Don’t you have any compassion? Are you a heartless monster? If you continue to be so stubborn, we’ll keep at you until you come clean—we’ll even take turns questioning you so that you won’t be able to get a decent night’s sleep!”
Finally, unable to withstand the insidious tactics of the devilish nature of authority, the man gave a false statement. During the subsequent trial, he recalled that moment with tears in his eyes: “Even when I’m working, it’s hard to make ends meet; if I had to stay in jail for who knows how long, my family would have starved… Therefore, offering an apology in my heart to the Gohonzon, I lied and said, ‘Chief of Staff Yamamoto told me to do it.’”