Kazunobu Chiba

This article is about the character Kazunobu Chiba. For the voice actor, see Isshin Chiba.

This is a featured article on the Detective Conan Wiki. This article was featured on November 24, 2022

Kazunobu Chiba
Profile
Japanese name:	千葉 和伸 (Chiba Kazunobu)
English name:	Detective Chiba (FUNimation) Kazunobu Chiba (Bangzoom!)
Age:	24
Gender:	Male
Relatives:	Older brother (Yoichiro Chiba) on that name
Occupation:	Police Detective
Statistics
First appearance:	Manga: File 269 Anime: Episode 138
Appearances:	Chapters: 101 Episodes: 230 Movies: 17 OVAs: 1 Specials: 1 Openings: 21 Closings: 7
Keyhole number:	Volume 33
Actors
Japanese voice:	Isshin Chiba
English voice:	Chris Cason (FUNimation) Jason Charles Miller (Bang Zoom!)

Kazunobu Chiba (千葉 和伸 ,Chiba Kazunobu), commonly referred to as Detective Chiba (千葉刑事 ,Chiba-keiji), is a character in the manga and anime franchise Detective Conan. Chiba is a detective in the Tokyo district, and very often works alongside Inspector Megure and Wataru Takagi. His main duty appears to be to obtain information outside of the crime scenes. Sometimes, he will even go out and substitute as inspector when Megure is busy on another case. He is a childhood friend and the love interest of Naeko Miike.

Background

A young Chiba.

Initially, he was introduced with a minor cameo in the anime version of The Final Screening Murder Case. Like several other Anime Original characters, he was later introduced in the manga and has taken on a larger role. In many of his early appearances he is depicted as rather average build, but later depicted as overweight. Chiba currently works in the Second violent crimes investigative division, section 3. His duties usually consist of questioning non-suspect characters outside of the crime scene, and running evidence back to the lab as well as returning with the results. A majority of his appearances happen just over half way through a case where he returns to the crime scene with a vital clue needed to solve the case. He has a strong moral compass that usually puts the law above everything. If any one were to break the law they must be punished, even himself.

Chiba has an older brother who worked as an employee at a video rental store. Because of his job, the brother had to open the heads of VHS tapes to check if they had been rewound properly. Chiba has picked up knowledge of VHS tapes as well as this habit of opening their heads to check them.

Chiba attended Teitan Elementary School, in the 20th graduating class, 2 classes below Sumiko Kobayashi. While still in elementary school he was a part of the broadcasting committee and was put in charge of making a mini-audio drama, which was successful. As a result, he tried to put together a short Tokusatsu (live action special effects) drama based on the Kamen Yaiba show he watched. With the help of fellow classmate Naeko Miike rallying the other members, he was able to complete it. He began to suspect that she may like him so he wrote her a love letter, which she responded to by saying that there was a hidden message left in the video room with her answer. Her family then moved away and Chiba was unable to find her answer.

In the present day, he returned to the school and with the help of the Detective Boys found her response. It was something that only Chiba would have been likely to find because since childhood, he has a tendency to sweat often. Recently Naeko, who joined the police force because of Chiba, has transferred to Tokyo as a patrol woman who works with Yumi Miyamoto. However, Chiba doesn't seem to recognize her despite having several chances to do so. After realizing that Chiba doesn't recognize her, Naeko has been trying to keep it a secret until he realizes it for himself.

Personality

Chiba can be serious, but he is shown to be a mostly light-hearted officer. He loves to eat and is sometimes shown stuffing his face, usually with burgers and sodas, but usually this is merely done for comic effect. Chiba can be very supportive, and is a big help, especially for using his size to catch criminals. He, as well as Yumi Miyamoto, is very supportive for Takagi's relationship and feelings for Sato, and is one of the few officers in the Tokyo district to not get involved in Shiratori's schemes to get the couple to break up.

A very notable trait of Chiba praised by his colleagues in Law Enforcement is that he would always follow and uphold the law no matter what the circumstances are, especially when it is he who breaks it. This is one of the main reasons why Naeko liked him in the first place; it was because he scolded her over a traffic violation, saying that doing the wrong thing will develop into a habit that's hard to get rid of. This event also inspired Naeko to join the Police Force as a traffic cop.

He has been a huge fan of tokusatsu shows like Kamen Yaiba and Gomera for a long time, and was a member of the broadcasting committee at his elementary school. For a project, he and the other club members made a tokusatsu film called Kamen Baiya. Since then his enjoyment tokusatsu has grown and his apartment seems to be covered in figurines based on the characters.

Chiba seems to be very knowledgeable about Betamax tapes He has a habit of checking VHS tapes to see if they were rewound. He believes he picked this habit up from his older brother.

Appellations

Picture	Name	What they call Chiba	What Chiba calls them
	Naeko Miike	Chiba-kun Chiba Kazunobu (in her thoughts)	Naeko-chan Miike Naeko
	Sakurako Yonehara	Chiba-tchi	Sakurako-chan

Picture	Name	What they call Chiba	What Chiba calls them
	Kiyonaga Matsumoto	Chiba	Managing Officer (Kanrikan)
	Wataru Takagi	Chiba	Takagi-san
	Ninzaburo Shiratori	Chiba-kun	Shiratori-san
	Yumi Miyamoto	Chiba-kun Chiba	Yumi-san
	Juzo Megure	Chiba-kun Chiba	Inspector Megure (Megure-keibu)
	Miwako Sato	Chiba-kun	Sato-san
	Eri Kisaki	Chiba-kun	-
	Jinpei Matsuda	-	Matsuda-san

Picture	Name	What they call Chiba	What Chiba calls them
	Conan Edogawa	Detective Chiba (Chiba-keiji)	Conan-kun
	Ran Mouri	Detective Chiba (Chiba-keiji)	Ran-san
	Kogoro Mouri	Chiba-chan	Mouri-san

Picture	Name	What they call Chiba	What Chiba calls them
	Genta Kojima	Chiba	-
	Mitsuhiko Tsuburaya	Detective Chiba (Chiba-keiji)	-
	Ayumi Yoshida	Detective Chiba (Chiba-keiji)	-
	Ai Haibara	Detective Chiba (Chiba-keiji)	-
	Hiroshi Agasa	Detective Chiba (Chiba-keiji)	-
	Sumiko Kobayashi	-	Kobayashi-sensei Sato-san (first time, by mistake)

Picture	Name	What they call Shiratori	What Shiratori calls them
	Yusaku Kudo	-	Kudo-sensei

Plot overview

Chiba's first manga appearance.

Sato's Father Case (Manga: 269, Anime 205-206)

Kazunobu Chiba makes his debut in the manga series.

Sato's Omiai Case (Manga: 328-330, Anime 253-254)

Takagi and Chiba work together to catch a robber despite conflicting witness statements. Once they finally discover the identity of the robber, he flees. After catching him, Chiba sends Takagi to stop the Omiai by saying "You're a detective right?, then like a detective... go after your target until the time actually runs out!"

Takagi's Last Case (Manga: 450-452, Anime: 390-391)

Chiba's roommate becomes the main suspect of a murder case. As a result Takagi, Sato, and the Detective Boys search the apartment for clues. The room is covered over with toys from the Kamen Yaiba and Gomera franchises. He tracks his tv programs using the newspaper listings and posts sticky notes of the times on his television.

Group Date Kidnapping Case (Manga: 511-514, Anime: 431-432)

Chiba invites Takagi on a group date to make the numbers even. The leader of the group is Chiba's middle school friend Emoto. Emoto mentions that Chiba had wanted to be a police officer since he was a kid. Emoto's sister happened to be friends with Yumi, who also dragged Sato along. After it is realized that a kid was left alone, the group agrees to go get him, however it seems that Chiba and Yumi are too drunk and they get left in the car.

Hammer Man Case (Manga: 625-627, Anime: 530-531)

Takagi is surprised when Sato tries to kiss him while on a stakeout, pretending they are a couple. When he mentions this to Chiba, he says that he has been on stakeout with Sato in the past where they also had pretended to be boyfriend and girlfriend. Chiba says that it was a warm feeling which makes Takagi jealous. Later Chiba asks Takagi how far his relationship with Sato has progressed, and reveals that in the past he and Sato had only held hands while she glared at the culprit. This makes Takagi rethink why Sato tried to kiss him.

VHS Tape of Memories (Manga: 741-742, Anime: 624)

Chiba says he deserves the parking ticket.

Chiba accompanies Shiratori to Teitan Elementary to deliver some notices about crime prevention. While in the video library room looking for a long lost tape, Chiba encounters the Detective Boys. He mentions that he was a part of the Broadcasting Committee for the school and was responsible for creating the morning announcements. As a trial run they had created a mini audio drama and later filmed a live action tokusatsu drama titled "Kamen Baiya". Chiba mentions that there was a girl who seemed really enthusiastic about helping him create the drama and even got other members to participate. Chiba had sent her a love letter and her reply mentioned a hidden message in the video room. He had never found it and had not seen her in the last 13 years. She had contacted him recently saying that she would go to a class reunion and wanted to know if he would be there and whether he had seen the tape. With the help of the Detective Boys he recovers the message and goes to meet her at the reunion. He parks illegally and rushes inside leaving his car running, however it seems she did not come. He returns to his car and encounters a police woman writing him a ticket. She tries to say that she might not finish because he is a police officer, but he tells her that he broke the law and deserves it. Chiba does not recognize her. After he leaves she reveals that she was the girl on the tape, Naeko Miike, and that she was transferring to Tokyo. Naeko is partnered with Yumi.

Co-Investigating with a First Love Case (Manga: 790-792, Anime: 659-660)

Naeko's hat flies off.

The Detective Boys come across Chiba's car with the message "Die" written inside. Chiba calls Yumi and Naeko to the scene. Conan and Haibara quickly realize that Naeko is the girl from Chiba's past and manage to lead the situation so that Chiba and Naeko end up investigating together. Naeko's hat is blown off by the wind and they look each other straight in the eyes, but Chiba still does not recognize her. Yumi realizes that if the two of them get together, that all of her friends may be too busy for her and tries to push them apart. Although by the end of the case, Yumi has Naeko drive Chiba back herself. Chiba says that he feels like he has met her before and recalls the time she wrote him a parking ticket. In his head he thought that surely she couldn't actually be Naeko from back then.

Yumi's Love Story Case (Manga: 847-849, Anime 731-732)

Sakurako Yonehara discovers a body and calls her childhood friend Naeko, who happens to be accompanied by Yumi and the Detective Boys. As usual, halfway through the investigation Chiba arrives at the crime scene to deliver important information. Sakurako and Chiba recognize each other because they went to the same elementary school. Chiba asks her if she remembers a certain someone who was always by her side, while remembering Naeko. The case then distracts them and its not brought back up.

UFO Sighting Murder Case (Manga: 942-944, Anime: 847-848)

Chiba tries to track down information on a case that he believes involved aliens. As he was leaving headquarters, a few patrol women commented on Chiba's weight. This resulted in Naeko sending him an anonymous package filled with weight loss pamphlets. She signed it as his "number one fan in the entire universe". The package also listed Chiba's full name as "Kazunobu Chiba". He manages to loose so much weight that even Ran almost doesn't recognize him. After the case it seems that the patrol women from before, now find Chiba attractive which results in Naeko sending him enough cookies to reverse his progress.

Policewomen Serial Murder Case (Manga: 1013-1017, Anime: 971-974)

At the Police department, Chiba is trying to find a suitable partner for his stake out. When Yumi suggested Naeko, Chiba responds that it would look like an inspector partnered with a middle school girl, much to Naeko's embarassment, even though she is the same age as him. After the murder of the second female police officer from the Traffic department, Chiba and Shiratori head out to the crime scene, where they meet up with Kuroda. The superintendant told the two inspectors that the case concerns a female police officer serial murder case. Later, Chiba managed to rescue a kidnapped Naeko and apprehend the culprit with judo, thanks to Conan's help. However, Naeko was injured in her right leg while protecting Chiba from a bowgun arrow trap, which forced Chiba to carry her to the hospital on his back. While walking towards the hospital, Chiba came across a red light with no cars around. To prevent Naeko from bleeding too much, Chiba wanted to cross it since nobody is around, however, Naeko stopped him form breaking the rules; using the same words he told her in the past. After hearing those words, Chiba finally recognises Naeko as his childhood friend. After the light became green, the couple crossed the road while blushing at the same time.

Non-canon plot overview

Chiba's original appearance in episode 138.

As a note, in many of Chiba's early anime and movie appearances, he is depicted as quite skinny. This is changed once his character begins to develop.

The Final Screening Murder Case (Manga: 222-224, Anime: 138-139)

Chiba's first appearance in the Anime. He was inserted into a Manga canon episode.

The Rainy Night Menace (Anime: 666)

Chiba had been meeting with this woman at a cafe that he frequented about several letters that she had been receiving from a man who was being released from prison who and was supposedly going to come after her. When she left from one of the meetings, she took Chiba's umbrella so he tried to track her down to return it. He enlisted the help of Kogoro and Conan to help him look for her, which turned up nothing. Then they get called to a near by apartment complex where a woman was involved in a crime. As it turns out, it is the same woman and she has killed the man who was sending her letters. At the conclusion of the case it is determined that it was a premeditated murder rather then self defense, and Chiba makes a statement to her as she is taken away.

Relationships analysis

Wataru Takagi

Chiba's thoughts on Takagi and Sato.

Takagi and Chiba are fellow officers in the 1st investigative division (Homicides) of the Metropolian Police, and very good friends and partners. In fact, Chiba was the only male officer in the department who did not harbor an obsessive crush on Sato and would even assist Takagi in his endeavors to win her heart. Takagi has even spent the night at Chiba's apartment multiple times and borrowed his T-shirts. When Takagi was kidnapped, Chiba maintained the closest proximity to the tablet showing Takagi's fate.

Miwako Sato

Chiba and Sato are shown to be just friends. However in the past they have gone on stakeouts two or three times together where they pretended to be boyfriend and girlfriend by holding hands, so Sato could glare at the culprit over Chiba's shoulders.

Ninzaburo Shiratori

Chiba seems to be supportive of Shiratori's relationship and makes fun of him in front of Kobayashi in a similar way to how he treats Takagi.

Naeko Miike

Chiba and Naeko were childhood friends and attended Teitan Elementary together where they both joined the school broadcasting committee (although Naeko only joined because Chiba did). One time Naeko tried to walk over a street despite there was red light, but Chiba stopped her and lectured her about bad habit, which caused her to cry, but also impressed her with his morality. When Naeko was to move away, Chiba wrote down his feelings in a love letter. Naeko wrote her response on the side of a VHS in the committee storage room, hoping Chiba's sweating habit would cause the message "I like you, too" to show up on his hands after grabbing the tape. Unfortunately, Chiba couldn't find the right tape and never got the message.

On the day of his elementary school reunion, Chiba returned to the school and searched for the tape again. With the help of Conan and the Detective Boys, he finally finds the message and heads for the reunion. Unfortunately Naeko doesn't show, and he hears from a former classmate that she said she is "now with the one she loved". Depressed, Chiba immediately leaves and finds a lady traffic cop giving him a ticket. When the officer offers to forget about the ticket since he is a fellow officer, Chiba scolds her for offering to ignore his illegal parking. Chiba leaves with the ticket, but then wonders how the girl knew he was a detective. The officer turns out to be Naeko, who has just been transferred to the police headquarters in Tokyo (working under Yumi) and looks forward to working with the one she loves.

Sakurako Yonehara

Chiba remembers that the person who created the message on the VHS tape (Naeko) was good friends with Sakurako, and they were always together. Sakurako was in the grade level below Chiba.

Chiba's older brother

Chiba's older brother worked at a video store where he was required to open the heads of VHS tapes to see if the video had been rewound. Chiba has picked this habit up from him because he thought it was cool.

Name origin

Chiba's name comes from his voice actor Isshin Chiba. The kanji for Isshin (一伸 ) can also be pronounced as "Kazunobu", which was the voice actor's original name. Gosho gave the character a given name with different kanji that are still pronounced as "Kazunobu" (和伸 ). His original physical appearance was modeled after him as well.

SDB70+ : Q73: Have you established detective Chiba’s first name?
A: His voice actor’s is Isshin… It might just become Isshin. But everyone with “一” (ichi) in their name is a cool guy… I don’t know what to do. (laughs)

He effectively removed the "一" (ichi) in Isshin Chiba (千葉 一伸 ) and changed it to a "和" which can be read as "Kazu" for the original name Kazunobu Chiba (千葉 和伸 ).

Different looks

Episode 138

Episode 173

Episode 363

Episode 666

After dieting (episode 848).

Quotes

“	If you break the rules and let yourself off the hook even once, it'll become a habit! You might think you can break a habit, but you can't!	„
— Kazunobu Chiba to Naeko Miike

Trivia

• His given name was revealed more than 500 chapters after his first appearance.
• Chiba has a scar on his right palm from falling down in the rain as a child.
• He is very able with judo.
• According to Gosho in JUSTICE PLUS Super Digest Book, his favourite food are Ramen, Hamburgers and Pizzas.

See also

• Characters
• Kazunobu Chiba and Naeko Miike