{"id":72651,"date":"2025-06-27T09:52:27","date_gmt":"2025-06-27T00:52:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/jun\/27\/yakuza-gangster-to-lawyer-yoshitomo-morohashi"},"modified":"2025-06-27T09:52:27","modified_gmt":"2025-06-27T00:52:27","slug":"breaking-good-the-yakuza-gangster-who-became-a-lawyer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=72651","title":{"rendered":"Breaking good: the yakuza gangster who became a lawyer"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A mental health crisis on a busy Tokyo street set one-time dealer and debt collector Yoshitomo Morohashi on a path to redemption, and life as a lawyer<\/p>\n<p>Yoshitomo Morohashi is every inch the lawyer, from his three-piece suit and designer glasses to the sunflower lapel badge identifying him as a member of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/japan\">Japan<\/a> Federation of Bar Associations.<\/p>\n<p>Then, with little encouragement, he removes his shirt and turns away to reveal a tattoo of an ancient warrior, a samurai sword clenched between his teeth, covering his entire back.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/jun\/27\/yakuza-gangster-to-lawyer-yoshitomo-morohashi\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A mental health crisis on a busy Tokyo street set one-time dealer and debt collector Yoshitomo Morohashi on a path to redemption, and life as a lawyerYoshitomo Morohashi is every inch the lawyer, from his three-piece suit and designer glasses to the su&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4825,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,88,1668],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-72651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-japan","category-organised-crime"],"aioseo_notices":[],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72651","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4825"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=72651"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72651\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72652,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72651\/revisions\/72652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=72651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=72651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=72651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}