Both suspects are managers of Akihabara shop allegedly selling Aqours-inspired hoodies

Police from Numazu City and Shizuoka Prefecture arrested two shop managers on Wednesday for their involvement in a shop that was allegedly selling fake Love Live! Sunshine!! merchandise in Akihabara, Tokyo.

The suspects allegedly offered hoodies bearing a logo similar to that of Aqours — the name of both the franchise 's in-story idol unit as well as the real-life idol unit composed of the anime's voice actresses — and thus infringing on the copyrights of the anime studio Sunrise . Both suspects were male residents of Koshigayashi, Saitama, with one suspect being 55 years old, and the other 46 years old.

Police seized seven allegedly copyright-infringing hoodies on the day of the arrest, and are investigating how they were produced.

A Sunrise representative commented on the arrest, noting that it was "regrettable that [the suspects'] actions deviated from normal fan activity."

The Love Live! Sunshine!! The School Idol Movie Over the Rainbow film recently opened in Japan at #4. The film has sold more than 500,000 tickets and earned a cumulative total of 712,448,400 yen (about US$6.52 million) at the box office in Japan. The Aqours idol group charted its first #1 single in the previous week.

Source: Shizuoka Shimbun via Nijipoi