A Very Metal Clown Was Arrested for Smuggling Drugs into Japan

An extremely metal clown has been arrested in Tokyo.

To be more specific, the clown in the clink is Dicksee Diànno, aka a 44-year-old Vancouver musician named Daniel Whitmore, who is the lead singer of the clown-inspired Iron Maiden cover band Powerclown.

Like Icarus, it seems Whitmore flew a little too close to the sun.

The musician was arrested on December 11 in Tokyo's Narita International Airport. He was allegedly caught with a load of drugs worth more than $7 million, reported to be stimulants. To get the drugs past customs, Whitmore apparently used tea cannisters and his guitar case. According to the News of Japan, Whitmore was going to drop the drugs off at a hotel.

"I was supposed to carry a guitar case as requested by a Chinese-based person in Canada," News of Japan said Whitmore told police. "I was scheduled to deliver it to a hotel in Narita City."

Whitmore faces up to 11 Wasted Years in a Japanese prison, which famously has a zero tolerance policy when it comes to drug charges. Two days before Whitmore was arrested, a Facebook post on his page—which is under the name Dan Scumm, another one of his alter-egos—seemed to hint at his actions:

“Are you an Asian drug dealer? Because you're bringing me down…”

Powerclown, which consists of Sketchy Clown, John Wayne Gary, Steve Hairlips, and Lippy Dongstalking, and fronted by Whitmore, is (if their webpage and numerous event pages are to be believed) made up up of members from several other well-known Vancouver punk bands like DOA, The Real McKenzies, and Death Sentence. While Dicksee—whose stage name is a reference to Maiden’s original lead singer Paul Di’Anno—was still Running Free, the band played shows for years including one as recently as just months ago.

Whitmore’s bandmates seem neither to be letting the alleged drug slinging clown off easy nor giving up on him. In a Facebook post put up by band member Sketchy Clown, they say the hope that they’ll see him “slide into his cock-pink pants and dance himself back home.”

“Flags are flying half mast at the Powerclown circus tent. I assure you, any frowns we are wearing are real. Painted on or not. All we can do is hope for the best for him,” reads the statement.

“Clownery and parlour tricks, whether by him or us ain't gonna do no good. Even with his voice, the voice of a songbird, and his velvet-painting-smooth charm, he won't be able to talk his way out of these hijinks, even if he did speak Japanese.”

It’s unknown if Whitmore will attempt to Run to the Hills or if he’ll be a Trooper and face the music.

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