The fire, the fifth-deadliest in post-war Japanese history,[1] burned for five hours before being extinguished and resulted in the death of 44 people and injuries to another three.

In the aftermath of the incident, media coverage (which declined after the September 11 attacks that occurred 10 days later) focused on the arrest and conviction of the property owners for criminal negligence and on the building's putative ties to organized crime.

Those charged included two executives of the Myojo Kosan Group, which owned the building, and the commercial tenants of the structure, which housed a video mahjong parlor and a hostess bar.

[7] Japan Today, an English-language online news outlet, quoted Tokyo police as stating that the mahjong parlor located in the building was "an illegal gambling den" with daily revenues of about eight million yen.

Japan Today's report speculates that the Chinese mafia and yakuza could have been linked to the incident, as illegal gambling operations are regularly forced to pay "protection money" to organized crime syndicates.