TOKYO, March 1 -- Shogakukan, one of Japan's leading manga publishers, is facing severe scrutiny after an editor at its Manga ONE service was implicated in an alleged attempt to silence a victim of sexual abuse perpetrated by a contracted author.

The scandal has prompted an internal investigation and led several manga creators to suspend their work on the platform.

The controversy centres on author Ichiro Hajime, whose real name is Kazuaki Kurita.

According to details from a civil lawsuit finalised in February 2026, Kurita groomed and sexually abused a female student, identified only as "A," over several years, beginning when she was 15 years old in 2016.

At the time, Kurita was a high school drawing instructor and was serialising the...