Saizo Kishimoto

Saizō Kishimoto was a Japanese gangster.
Born in Kobe, he joined the Japanese Imperial Navy air squadron during World War II. After the war, he became a city employee of the Kobe City Office. In 1955, he joined a clan with Yakuza leader Nakayama Yoshikazu under a branch of the Yamaguchi-gumi. Over the next 40 years, he rose up the ladder in his gang and held the rank of sō-honbuchō, the headquarters chief of the Yamaguchi-gumi.
In 1973, he was promoted from Shateigashira" of the Nakayama-gumi to a member of the third Yamaguchi after Nakayama retired. In June 1984, he go the position of both "Honbucho" and "Wakagashira-hosa" for the fourth Yamaguchi-gumi. When the fifth Yamaguchi started in 1989, he was promoted to shatei and assumed the position of "Sohonbucho". He acted for the "Wakagashira" and the "Shateigashira" for the Yamaguchi-gumi since October of 1998.
In late 2005, he was named leader of a more recent Yamaguchi-gumi clan, called the Hanshin-kai. He was also the godfather or kumichō of the Kishimoto-gumi.