Investigators also found that the former municipal bus driver did not hold the type of license required to drive passengers for hire
2-MIN READ2-MIN ListenKyodoPublished: 2:25pm, 8 May 2026Japanese police have arrested a bus driver on suspicion of negligent driving after a crash on a Fukushima expressway killed a high school student on Wednesday, as investigators look into whether he was speeding and driving without the proper license required to carry passengers for hire.On Friday morning, Fukushima prefectural police searched bus operator Kanbara Tetsudo in Gosen, Niigata prefecture.
The arrested driver, Tetsuo Wakayama, 68, told investigators after his arrest on Thursday that he was driving at 90km/h (56mph) to 100km/h at the time in the 80km/h zone, according to the police.
Police are investigating possible violations over unlicensed commercial operations, as it was found that Wakayama did not hold the type of license required to drive passengers for hire.
Police said Wakayama confessed to having “misjudged the speed”. No significant skid marks were found at the crash site on the Banetsu Expressway in Koriyama, according to the police.
Wakayama is suspected of causing the bus carrying 20 members of the boys’ tennis team of Niigata’s Hokuetsu High School to crash into a crash barrier on the expressway on Wednesday morning.
