mobster 復習
組事務所に届いた代金引換の宅配物を脅し取ろうとしたとして、警視庁は２人の暴力団員を恐喝未遂容疑で逮捕しました。
Yakuza mobsters prove no match for brawny deliveryman
The mean streets of Tokyo have a new crime-busting superhero: deliveryman.
A 38-year-old courier of Sagawa Express Co. outmatched two yakuza gangsters who wrongly assumed he would be intimidated by their affiliation to organized crime.
The bulky courier not only disarmed one of the gangsters who was waving a replica gun, but he also took away the delivery package--a luxury watch--from their greedy paws, police said.
Yusuke Kodama, 32, and Hidekazu Oba, 35, both gang members affiliated with the Matsuba-kai crime syndicate, were arrested on suspicion of attempted extortion, the Metropolitan Police Department said Oct. 27.
Oba on June 12 ordered a luxury watch priced at about 860,000 yen ($8,221) through the Internet on cash-on-delivery basis.
When the courier arrived with the package at a gang office in Tokyo’s Arakawa Ward the following day, Kodama and Oba staged a fight over “yakuza family trouble,” according to the Arakawa Police Station.
Oba pointed the fake gun at Kodama in front of the deliveryman, expecting him to flee in terror and allow the gangsters to keep the timepiece without paying.
Not on his watch.
The courier, accompanied by his 44-year-old colleague, snatched the toy gun from Oba as well as the parcel. The deliveryman left and called the proper authorities, while the flustered gangsters fled from the office.
According to police, Oba had admitted to the allegations, saying: “The deliveryman was too brawny. I knew I was no match for him.”
Kodama has denied any involvement in the failed heist, saying Oba acted alone, according to police.
The true identity of the deliveryman was not revealed.
http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201610280058.html
今回取り上げる表現は、見出しにある“mobster”です。『ウィズダム英和辞典』(第３版、三省堂)を引いたところ、「ギャングの一員」とありました。確認のためにLDOCEを引いたところ、“a member of an organized criminal group”と定義されていました。類義語として“gangster”があります。
今回の単語は“mob”と“-ster”に分解することができます。“mob”は「集団」を意味する単語ですが、第３義には「マフィア；ギャング[暴力]団」という意味があります(『ウィズダム英和辞典』)。接尾辞の“-ster”には「…する人、…に関わる人、…である人」という意味です。
“mob”について書かれた記事があるので、そちらもご覧ください。
