Fake Sewage Workers Go Door-to-Door

A tablet given to a local woman by a group of men posing as sewage workers who told her to swallow it if her tap water became dirty, has proven to be an chemical pipe cleaning agent, investigators said....
Several men visited the home of the victim in the Nagata Sannodai district of Minami-ku, Yokohama on Thursday morning, and handed a blue and white tablet to the resident, bureau officials said. "We're carrying out sewage works in the neighborhood. Please put this tablet into the drainage pipe if the tap water becomes turbid or gives off a foul smell," one of the men was quoted as telling the resident. The men later visited the home again and asked the resident if they used the tablet. No sewage work was underway at the time. A 70-year-old woman living in Kanagawa-ku, Yokohama, was told to swallow the tablet they gave her. They subsequently visited her home and asked her if she took it. When she answered she did not swallow it, the men asked her why she failed to take it.