Man arrested for stealing ¥10 million gold tea bowl in Tokyo

Tokyo police on Saturday arrested a man in his 30s for allegedly stealing a pure-gold tea bowl from an event site at an outlet of major department store operator Takashimaya.

According to sources including from the Metropolitan Police Department, the bowl, made of 24-karat gold, is priced at ¥10,406,000 ($67,860). It was stolen around 11:40 a.m. Thursday from the exhibition event venue on the eighth floor of Takashimaya's Nihonbashi store in Tokyo's Chuo Ward.

Security camera footage showed a man putting the bowl in his backpack and fleeing toward Tokyo Metro's Nihonbashi Station about 30 minutes later.

Investigators found the man in Tokyo on Saturday and questioned him on a voluntary basis before arresting him.

At the event, being held over six days until Monday, a total of more than 1,000 pure-gold items are on display, including a screen with a price of ¥100 million and a 2.1-meter-tall dragon using about 3,000 sheets of golden leaves which has a price tag of ¥38 million, according to Takashimaya and a company that organized the event.

The golden tea bowl in question was showcased in a hexagonal acrylic box without any alarm or lock. Takashimaya said at a news conference Friday that a salesperson near the bowl was turning around slightly at the time of the theft in order to attend other visitors.