Interviews
Finding his relative among Japanese prisoners
They're gonna have a war crime trial so since I was there, so therefore they appoint me to investigate, and so helped at the tribunal. And they wanted me to go find out, look and see the unit roster and also passenger list to be repatriate to Japan. But meantime their prisoners surrender, so they kept in the compound like a schoolhouses or playground or whatever and certain unit were segregated certain place. So they gave me the list of names who belong to a unit, happened to be 5th Division and I went through and looking for certain names because name was given a suspect who might have committed crime. So going through, then I saw the familiar name and the ring to me, happened to be name was Yoro Omoto. Then that's a similar name, you know, I had a relative there and then I know his name was Japanese, Yoro but his name was Harry Omoto and he happened to be my second cousin.
And so I commandeered the jeep and Chinese interpreter and he, driver, he know where the camp was so we went there, then at the guard and gate tell him, I want to interview this man. So they thought the MP or, I wore a MP band and so, armband, and went there so they thought I'm coming after him, and he thought he was one of the criminals to be picked up because everybody has a guilty conscience of minor crime they committed. So they're aware of that so they thought right away he was one of the suspect. But, so I give 'em a name and get him and as he turn around the corner he came, he spotted me even though I'm in uniform, he recognized me and he says, Hiroshi Niisan, that means elder brother Hiroshi. I'm not a brother but I'm closer than brother because he lived with me in Los Angeles before he was inducted in the Japanese army.
Date: December 17 & 18, 2003
Location: Washington, US
Interviewer: Alice Ito, Tom Ikeda
Contributed by: Denshō: The Japanese American Legacy Project.
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