Shichitorikoi (Action of demanding compensation) (質取行為)
In the medieval Japan, Shichitorikoi was an action of a creditor, who could not receive compensation from a debtor living in a different region, to capture a third person who lived in the same region as the creditor (regardless of whether the person is acquainted with the debtor or not) or to privately confiscate the person's properties as compensation for the debt. Sometimes the accuser (creditor) sued a third person who lived in the same region as the accused (debtor).
In this case, Shichitorikoi was called differently depending on the subject 'area'.
Shichitorikoi targeting a resident living in the same ryoseikoku (province) => kunijichi
Shichitorikoi targeting a resident living in the same shoen (private estate) => shojichi
Shichitorikoi targeting a resident living in the same go (an administrative unit of provincial land) => gojichi
Shichitorikoi targeting a resident living in the same village => murajichi
Shichitorikoi targeting a resident living in the same place (city/town/shoryo [territory]/za [trade guild]) => tokorojichi
These acts only differed in the regional categories, and the contents were almost the same.
Summary
This has been said to be the group responsibility/collective responsibility imposed on people in a blood relationship in a clan society, that changed into a common law, following the collapse of a clan society and social shaping by territorial connections. It is said that this was related to the cognition of people then that they would spend their whole lifetime where they lived with the supports from their place of residence. It was often seen in and after the period of the Northern and Southern Courts when the formation of the Shugo-ryogoku system (the system that a Shugo dominates a manor) and the goson-sei (system of coalitions of villages) advanced. It is also said that gojichi was more frequent in the Togoku (eastern Japan) where goson-sei was developed, while tokorojichi was more frequent in the Saigoku (western Japan) where business/transportation developed rather than the goson-sei. Even in the case of murder, seizing and taking a debtor's life instead of a murderer's as a part of adauchi (revenge including killing)/fukushu (revenge) was justified as a way of Shichitorikoi.
While the Muromachi bakufu (Japanese feudal government headed by a shogun) and Sengoku daimyo (Japanese territorial lord in the Sengoku period) banned Shichitorikoi in so-called sanctuary-like places such as markets and streets, there were only restrictions and was no law to ban the actions because Shichitorikoi was effective as the existence of the above-mentioned cognition of the group responsibility in a local community and the general cognition as a common law and mental pressure on the debtor to pay for his or her debt.
It was recognized that these customs had existed until the Edo bakufu established the system and law to rule the whole Japan.