A 22-year-old man who went on a rampage on a shinkansen (bullet train) last month, fatally stabbing one man and injuring two women, began a psychiatric evaluation on Friday. The Yokohama District Court ordered the examination to determine if the man is mentally competent to stand trial.
Ichiro Kojima, an unemployed 22-year-old man, was on the 16-car Nozomi 265 bullet train as it was traveling between Shin-Yokohama and Odawara stations on the Tokaido Shinkansen Line at around 9:45 p.m. on June 9. There were around 880 passengers aboard the train bound for Shin-Osaka.
Kojima was in the No. 12 car when he pulled out a cleaver and a knife and attacked two women passengers at random. Kotaro Umeda, a 38-year-old man from Hyogo Prefecture, was fatally stabbed as he tried to protect the women who sustained injuries to their heads and shoulders.
After his arrest, Kojima told police he hated society and wanted to kill someone and that it didn’t matter who, Fuji TV reported.
Tokyo Metropolitan Police have apprehended a man who is suspected of slashing another man and a woman at a railway station in Bunkyo ward on Thursday, reports NHK (Feb. 14). (tokyoreporter.com)
The government confirmed Friday that it will follow the procedures taken to pick the current era name of Heisei in choosing a name for the new era.
(Japan Times)
A 20-year-old former policeman was sentenced Friday to 22 years in prison for shooting his boss to death at a police box in Hikone, Shiga Prefecture, last April. (Japan Times)
A 16-year-old female high student has been arrested for extorting a man she met while engaging in papakatsu — the practice of a sugar daddy paying young girls in exchange for having dinner and dates.
(Japan Today)
Rental unit provider Leopalace21 said Thursday that possible construction code violations were found in an additional 1,324 of its apartment buildings, a discovery that will require the relocation of roughly 14,000 tenants. (Nikkei)
The operator of one of Japan's largest sushi restaurant chains said Wednesday that video footage recently uploaded to the internet showed one of its part-time kitchen workers throwing sliced fish into a trash can and returning it to a cutting board at an outlet in Osaka Prefecture. (Kyodo)
The mother of a 10-year-old girl who died last month at their home in Chiba Prefecture has told police that she sometimes gave the girl no food, at her husband’s insistence, in the days before her daughter’s death, investigative sources said Tuesday. (Japan Times)