Lonely elderly in Japanese crime wave

TOKYO - Clad in black like an ancient-day ronin or samurai, a man scales walls and squeezes into tight spaces in the dark - but in the name of crime.

His agility eluded the Osaka police for over eight years, during which more than 29 million yen ($255,000) was stolen in about 250 crimes.

But Mitsuaki Tanigawa, dubbed the "Heisei Ninja" - named after the current imperial era - is 74 and, by police accounts, a doddering old man in the day.