Generally speaking, if they were Konoha residents, even after Yuya had threatened and bribed them into considering targeting other merchants, they would have been just as conflicted as this wealthy merchant.
But there was one kind of merchant who wouldn't be.
Spies sent by other countries.
They served other countries and felt no qualms about killing Konoha's merchants.
So Yuya felt no qualms about arresting them, either.
And even if he did arrest the wrong people, it didn't matter. These merchants were all a bunch of scum who deserved to die a thousand deaths. Arresting the wrong person wasn't the same as killing one, so what was there to worry about?
As for whether there might be any wrongful convictions...
The Yamanaka Clan's secret techniques were enough to make these guys reveal even the color of their underwear.
After that, it would be easy to tell whether they were spies.
The Yamanaka Clan wasn't as powerful as the Uchiha Clan, but it had a larger population. After all, they and the Senju Clan were always fighting, and those two clans suffered the most deaths. Still, they had been among the most prosperous clans during the Warring States period, at least managing to keep their people from starving.
The clan's secret technique was quite interesting. The Mind Transfer Jutsu could pry into secrets. It could be resisted by ninja of comparable strength, but it was still very useful as a support technique.
What's more, when the targets were merchants, it was just perfect.
Whatever happened in the process, the number of merchants was cut in half.
A few of them were confirmed to be spies for Sunagakure, Kirigakure, and Kumogakure.
Oh, and Iwagakure, too.
Damn it, the first shipment hadn't even arrived, but the spies had already shown up. What,