Tokyo, May 26 (EFE).- The man armed with a weapon similar to a hunting rifle and a knife who kept the Japanese city of Nakano on edge for hours after opening fire, causing four deaths and then barricading himself, was arrested early morning.
The person arrested is Masanori Aoki, 31, the eldest son of the speaker of the municipal assembly in that city, located in the Nagano prefecture (center), who, according to local police, barricaded himself for hours in his parents’ home after stabbing a woman and shooting two policemen to death.
The fourth fatality is another woman who was found injured and unconscious outside the residence, and whose death occurred later.
In addition, two other women managed to escape from the house where the man entrenched himself, including his mother, and it was confirmed that the 57-year-old municipal legislator was in a safe whereabouts.
The reasons behind the incident are unknown at this time.
A hundred agents investigate the event
“It is an extremely cruel case and we have formed a team of 100 agents to be able to clarify this multiple murder,” Nagano Prefectural Police Chief Iwao Koyama said at a conference today, lamenting the death of the agents “while they were complying with his duty”.
For now, Aoki has been charged with the murder of one of the policemen, while evidence continues in relation to the other deaths, from which new charges are expected to emerge.
Local police received an emergency call before 4:30 p.m. local time on Thursday (10:30 GMT), reporting the alleged stabbing of a woman.
A witness who was working in some fields near the scene of the incident stated that half an hour earlier, he saw the assailant chasing a woman who was screaming for help.
According to the account of this witness, the alleged perpetrator of the attack, who was dressed in camouflage clothing, sunglasses, a hat and a mask, grabbed the woman’s arm and stabbed her in the back with a knife with a blade of about 30 centimeters long, and stabbed her again in the chest when she lay on her back.
According to this same source, he asked the assailant why he had done such a thing and he replied: “I killed her because I wanted to.”
The deceased woman has been identified as Yukie Murakami, 66, and lived near the scene.
A house rifle
When the attacker walked away from the scene of his first crime, the 72-year-old witness ran to his home located about 150 meters from the scene, called the police and led the officers to a nearby parking area.
The assailant reappeared as the police parked and opened fire with a weapon similar to a hunting rifle.
The witness, terrified by the shots, fled.
Two policemen were hit in the shooting and later died, Inspector Yoshiki Tamai, 46, and Sergeant Takuo Ikeuchi, 61.
The suspect then moved to his parents’ residence, where he barricaded himself for hours before leaving after 4:30 a.m. local time this Friday (7:30 p.m. GMT on Thursday).
a quiet area
The incident shocked the inhabitants of a normally quiet part of the city, littered with houses and rice fields.
Police cordoned off a 300-meter area around the crime scene and asked residents to temporarily evacuate.
Japan has one of the lowest homicide and firearms incident rates in the world, and such incidents are rare.
The Asian country applies strict regulations for the possession of devices of this type, which is strictly prohibited with the exception of weapons with specific uses such as hunting.