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THE OFFICIAL STORY

Here’s the official timeline of events:

Akihiko Watanabe had connections to the yakuza. His daughter ran away from home and married a serviceman and sniper, Jerry Kichida. She presumably told Jerry all kinds of stories about her father’s abuse. Years after his wife was dead, Jerry Kichida told his son Kevin to make himself scarce for a while and got an old friend in Military Intelligence to investigate Akihiko Watanabe.

The friend from Military Intelligence was promptly killed.

Kevin went into hiding, but his best friend, Max Selwyn, disappeared shortly afterward.

Several Asian men wound up dead, shot by a sniper near the warehouse of an Asian importer whose identity turned out to be a complete fabrication.

Tatum’s sheriff, Ted Cahill, turned in a fingerprint while investigating Max Selwyn’s disappearance. The fingerprint was red-flagged by Interpol as belonging to an ex-yakuza member. Ted Cahill too disappeared shortly after this time.

The Asian importer who didn’t really exist abandoned the warehouse and closed down his bank accounts.

Max Selwyn was found wandering aimlessly on the interstate. He had obviously been drugged, was dehydrated and disoriented, and didn’t remember anything except for a vague impression of frightening Asian men.

Kevin Kichida reported that he hadn’t heard from his father and was worried about him around the same time.

The official conclusion from all of these events seems to be that Ted Cahill and Max Selwyn were unfortunate casualties in a feud that erupted between Jerry Kichida and his father-in-law. Jerry burned Akihiko’s cover and probably died in the process. Akihiko fled to start over again somewhere new.

Interpol is still looking for both or either of them.