Influencer attracts ire for April Fool’s prank about alleged assault victim Nagisa Watanabe

When April Fool’s Day pranks go wrong.

Yesterday, we posted about the successful April Fool’s Day stunt by gravure model Jun Amaki, who teased us that she was retiring. Of course, she wasn’t and it was just a prank to get attention, and she even managed to attract news articles and raise her profile.

Influencer Sarimaru Kunikida’s prank, though, attracted a very different kind of reaction.

The mom of one who works in PR and recruitment posted on April Fool’s Day not about herself but about a guy from her company called Yuji Mizoguchi, a well-known entrepreneur and wrestler (and former boyfriend of the model Tenchim).

On the evening of April 1, she “announced” to her nearly 158,000 followers that Mizuoguchi had married the TV announcer Watanabe and included a (presumably mocked-up) photo of the pair together.

Who’s Nagisa Watanabe? None other than the woman rumored to be the victim of a serious sexual assault by former SMAP superstar Masahiro Nakai, a scandal that has abruptly ended his career and has devastated the broadcaster Fuji TV, which is accused of a condoning grooming and abuse by celebrities.

The backlash was swift and severe. Many were shocked that Kunikida could joke about a woman who has allegedly suffered a sexual assault, PTSD, and online bashing from Nakai’s fans.

Yuji Mizoguchi himself publicly responded less than an hour later that Kunikida should delete the post, which she dutifully did, and followed with an apology post, though she has subsequently embraced the controversy (her current X profile reads “now being flamed”). After all, there’s no such thing as bad publicity in an era when we have too many influencers and you need to stand out from the crowd.

Kunikida, who is 27, has previously done gravure shoots, but married in 2023, gave birth last year, and recently joined Mizoguchi’s company.