Company directors connected to Cambodia’s Prince Group, which the United States has designated a transnational criminal organization, have acquired millions of dollars in luxury Tokyo real estate, according to property and flight records obtained by OCCRP. 

Japan has not made any public statements about investigating the Prince Group, and a person who answered the phone at police headquarters in Tokyo told OCCRP they were unable to answer questions. The news agency and its Japanese media partner Tansa identified three directors of Prince Group-linked companies who hold real estate in or around Tokyo. None of the three has been personally sanctioned, though each served as a director at companies that were.

Chen Bo, originally from China and holding a Cambodian passport, purchased a property in a gated community in Chiba prefecture in 2019, and a second mansion near Zenpukuiji Park in central Tokyo, the latter acquired just days before the U.S. and UK imposed sanctions on the Prince Group in October 2025. He transferred the downtown property to his wife shortly after the sanctions were announced, according to the report.  

Japanese media reported the two properties together are worth approximately $7 million. Corporate records show Chen Bo served as a director at nine companies that were subsequently sanctioned, including two that the UK designated for allegedly providing financial services to the Prince Group, OCCRP said. 

Su Chang, a co-director at one of Chen Bo’s companies, purchased an apartment at a prime development in Tokyo’s Minato neighborhood in 2021, according to land records. Flight records obtained by OCCRP show Su Chang traveled to Japan on a private jet alongside Hu Xiaowei, a sanctioned individual with reported ties to Prince Group chairman Chen Zhi. The jet is owned through a shell company Hu Xiaowei controls via a British Virgin Islands entity. 

Flight records also show the aircraft made multiple trips to Japan beginning in March 2023, including at least two from Phnom Penh following the October 2025 sanctions announcement, according to the report. Hong Kong’s Department of Justice has since applied for a freezing order against Hu Xiaowei’s assets.

Brendon Luo, also known as Luo Pinghua, purchased a luxury apartment in the Shibuya neighborhood in May 2025, land records cited by OCCRP show. He is listed as a director at Prince Plaza Investment Co. Ltd., whose chairman is Chen Zhi and which the U.S. Treasury Department targeted as part of the Prince Group network.

Japan has no civil forfeiture mechanism, a key tool used by authorities in the UK and elsewhere to freeze and seize assets when subjects cannot demonstrate legitimate acquisition. The Financial Action Task Force flagged the gap in Japan’s 2021 mutual evaluation, finding that the scope of restraint and confiscation pursued was not in keeping with the country’s risk profile, according to OCCRP.

The October 2025 U.S. and UK actions alleged that the Prince Group operated industrial-scale cyberfraud out of compounds in Cambodia reliant on human trafficking. Since then, South Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, and Thailand have announced sanctions, asset freezes, arrests, and criminal charges against individuals and entities linked to the group. In January 2026, Cambodian authorities arrested Chen Zhi and extradited him to China, where state media reported he is suspected of running fraud operations and concealing proceeds.