Japanese police say they have found that a former cram school teacher arrested last month on suspicion of taking indecent images of a pupil wrote a novel describing acts similar to those he is charged with.
Mori Sosho taught at a major private cram school preparing students to take junior high school entrance examinations. He was served a fresh arrest warrant on suspicion of indecency through compulsion and other crimes earlier this month.
The 24-year-old is alleged to have forced an elementary school girl to allow him take indecent images of her during a one-on-one interview session at a school facility in Tokyo in May.
He has reportedly admitted to the allegation.
Police in Tokyo say it has been confirmed that he took such images of at least about a dozen students. They suspect that he repeatedly uploaded the images to social media sites.
Police say they later found that he had written and released a sexually explicit novel on the internet when he was a university student. The novel contains descriptions of a cram school teacher committing indecent acts on a pupil and taking indecent images of the victim.
The police added that the novel also contains an episode where a child becomes the target of indecent acts after being kidnapped.
An association of private cram schools is calling on the government to allow private cram schools to have access to a system the government is planning to introduce to protect children against sex crimes.
The system, modeled after Britain's Disclosure and Barring Service, would certify that individuals applying for jobs that involve working with children are not convicted sex offenders.
An expert panel of the Children and Families Agency compiled a preliminary report last week. The report said the use of the system should be mandatory for schools, daycare centers and child welfare facilities, while others, including cram schools, can adopt the system voluntarily.