Hikaru Kondo, the founding father of Demon Slayer and Destiny/keep Night time animation studio Ufotable, will keep away from serving time for his tax evasion prices.
Hikaru Kondo, the founder and head of the anime studio that produces the Demon Slayer anime, won’t serve any jail time for his latest tax evasion conviction.
As reported by TV Asahi, Kondo’s sentencing was held in Japan on Dec. 10, the place the founding father of animation studio Ufotable was given a suspended sentence, which requires him to remain out of authorized bother for the following three years. If Kondo does handle to seek out himself crossing the regulation once more throughout that point, he’ll then be topic to his full sentence of 20 months in jail. The animation firm itself was given a nice of 30 million yen (roughly the equal of $260,000 USD,) a lowered quantity from the 40 million yen that prosecutors had been initially pursuing. Ufotable issued an apology for the incident on its web site, and said that it has already begun to pay again the roughly $4 million USD in taxes that it beforehand didn’t pay.
Kondo, who was charged with evading over $1 million USD in taxes himself, has said that he meant to make use of the cash to guard Ufotable from any potential future downturns in enterprise. Prosecutors refuted that assertion, saying that Kondo used the cash for investments meant to extend his private wealth, comparable to shopping for up actual property. On the sentencing listening to, the court docket mentioned how Kondo pressured his spouse, who serves as Ufotable’s chief accountant, into manipulating the corporate’s tax filings.
Kondo and the studio had been initially indicted on tax evasion prices on July 9. Each Ufotable and its founder issued statements the place they initially denied the allegations, however Kondo ended up confessing to the costs in September, and the animation firm equally introduced that that they had now filed corrected tax paperwork and had been paying again the owed quantity of taxes.
Ufotable was based by Kondo in 2000. The studio was initially finest identified for its frequent collaborations with online game writer Bandai Namco on initiatives such because the anime variations of the favored RPG Tales of Symphonia and the Monster Hunter-esque God Eater. The studio additionally created the acclaimed Fate/stay Night: Limitless Blade Works, which acquired widespread reward for its feature-quality animation. Ufotable started its largest success in 2019, when it produced the anime adaptation of Koyoharu Gotouge’s hit shonen manga, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba. The sequence has develop into one of the widespread anime and manga franchises around the globe, with its 2020 continuation film, Mugen Train, changing into the best grossing anime film of all time, shattering a file that was beforehand held by Studio Ghibli’s Spirited Away for greater than a decade.
Supply: TV Asahi
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