Over the past few years, many have seen pictures floating around on the internet of AKB48 fans bulk buying CDs and later dumping the now-unwanted CDs in the trash or selling them to resale shops. Another new case of this has now come to light.

A 32 year old man in Dazaifu, Fukuoka Prefecture has been charged with violating waste disposal laws after he dumped 585 AKB48 CDs on the side of a mountain. This wasteful act occurred in June, when the group was holding voting for their annual election, using the single “Negaigoto no Mochigusare” as the means of selling the voting ballots. The police say the man used the voting ballots inside the CDs and then illegally dumped them.

The man says that he was part of a group of fans that was assisting another fan from Chiba Prefecture in the voting process. The fan group gathered about 1000 ballots from the CDs that the Chiba Prefecture fan sent them. The man kept about 600 of the CDs. He was at a loss as to what to do with the CDs seeing as how there were so many of them. The large amount of CDs meant that he couldn’t put them out with his regular trash, leading him to find another way to dispose of them: the mountain.

In mid-June, a local walking on the mountain found several boxes of  AKB48 CDs with the names and addresses of the sender and the recepitent, leading to the arrest.

Photos the trashed CDs:

Source