Masaru Takumi

Masaru Takumi
宅見 勝
Takumi featured on a nonfiction book after his death
Born	(1936-06-22)June 22, 1936 Chuo-ku, Kobe, Hyogo, Japan
Died	August 28, 1997(1997-08-28) (aged 61) Oriental Hotel, Kobe
Cause of death	Assassination by gunshots
Nationality	Japanese
Known for	Organized crime figure
Allegiance	Yamaguchi-gumi

Masaru Takumi (宅見 勝 Takumi Masaru; June 22, 1936 – August 28, 1997) was a powerful Japanese organized crime figure assassinated in 1997. Until his death, he was the second-in-command (wakagashira) and financial overseer of Japan's largest yakuza gang, the Yamaguchi-gumi. Known as "the man who never sleeps", he also headed his own sub-organization, the 1000-member Takumi-gumi.

He was considered a likely successor to the Yamaguchi-gumi's fifth godfather, Yoshinori Watanabe,^[1] but in August 1997, Takumi was shot and killed in a coffee shop on the fourth floor of the Oriental Hotel in Kobe by members of a breakaway Yamaguchi affiliate, the Nakano-kai.^[2] An innocent bystander was killed by a stray bullet in the attack, which led to the downfall of the Nakano-kai.

His last position at the Yamaguchi-gumi was as wakagashira (the number-two), and after his death, the wakagashira post became vacant and had been vacant until 2005 when it was succeeded by Kiyoshi Takayama.^[3] The Takumi-gumi's head position was succeeded by Tadashi Irie.^[4]

His mistress was the sister of Hideki Saijo [1] ,^[5][6] a Japanese singer and an actor most famous for singing the Japanese version of the Village People's hit song "Y.M.C.A.",^[7] called "Young Man".