Police arrested a 60-year old man Friday on suspicion of abandoning a body in connection with the discovery of a headless female corpse in a suitcase beneath a cliff in Kanazawa, police said.
The suspect, Seiichi Iinuma, a resident of the Ishikawa prefectural capital, told the police that he killed the woman, a foreigner in her 30s, with whom he became acquainted through a magazine ad, according to the investigators.
Ishikawa prefectural police Friday began searching for the victim's head, based on Iinuma's confession that he dumped the head together with the suitcase when he abandoned the body in the mountains near the border of Ishikawa and Toyama prefectures, they said.
Iinuma, accompanied by his lawyer, turned himself in Thursday evening to a police station in Kanazawa, and admitted to the allegation of abandoning the victim's body, they said.
''Every night, I could hardly sleep because of the sensational media coverage of the incident,'' Iinuma was quoted as telling the investigators.
According to the autopsy, the victim's head was severed with a sharp blade.
The suitcase containing her body was found March 29 at the foot of the cliff by a construction worker.
Iinuma is suspected of abandoning the victim's body early last October.
© News reports
37 Comments
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papigiulio
is this a trend? Everyday im reading things like this. 2 months, mustve been one helluva smell. yuck
borscht
Why no name? Is he a minor or has he not been charged with abandoning a body yet?
skipbeat
If they arrested the man who dumped the headless body why don't they ask him the name of the headless body?
Is this necessary. I don't want to know the details. I just want the person who did this capture instead of on the loose.
bamboohat
ya think?
Bootsy
Sounds like a scene from "Highlander".
Greapper1
They should question him regarding Miyako Hiraoka's death also :o
netrek
What a sick man he is. Terrible!
Ktak
@skipbeat, I agree that maybe they could have skipped the part about the sharp bladed tool, but the other details (approximate age, height and time of disappearance, etc.) serves an important purpose since the victim hasn't been identified yet. This is how the police get leads from the public when suspects can't or won't provide the information they need.
rubytree
It seems you can't have a simple disagreement with the Japanese. Most of these murders happen because of silly little arguments...
Mittsu
Which is why conflict is avoided because once it begins it can get out of control so quickly. Like arguing with a child.
Sheeple
nowhere in this article does it state or even elude to an argument between perp and victim...dont jump to conclusions
skipbeat
@Ktak,
Point taken. I don't want to know the detail of how the body was decapitated. I am not used to Japanese news to be explicit how a crime was committed on some of their article including that info.
shufu
Ugh ... "foreigner" what does that mean? Was she caucasian? Russian? Korean? What?!
Im sure the international community of Kanazawa would be a great help in looking for one of their own if they would release something other than "she was not Japanese!"
As skipbeat said - its so graphic, yet gives nothing useful to the readers.
WilliB
The article leaves more questions than it answers.
flamnhead
the point was she was a foreigner. one of those people.
dolphingirl
shufu--Exactly. Foreigner doesn't exactly narrow it down much. And I don't think the police do any negotiating here. Like 'if you cooperate and give us her identity we will ask prosecutors for a lesser sentence'. Actually, maybe they shouldn't be releasing any details to the public yet. I'm sure the parents of this woman don't want to find out about the death of their daughter like this.
Teachmeteachyou
I really don't want to hear all these details, I also find it a bit degrading to treat it all so impersonally. No doubt this is seen as some sort of "professional, objective detachment", but it seems a little wrong-headed to me, treating people as objects. Really, we need to know more of what she looked like, not about the crime.
Gurukun
I pray for the woman. But, LOL! From 20-39 year is 19 years! 155cm tall? and a foreigner? Thanks for narrowing that down. And then 2 weeks to 2 months since her death? They can narrow that down juuuuusssst a little bit more? Where is CSI?!
sarahsoy29
I imagine without the head it's not so easy to tell right away things like age and ethnicity.
Apsara
So, given a body without a head that was presumably in quite an advanced state of decomposition, you think you could make a more accurate estimation of her age? Presumably that is all the experts can get with the evidence they currently have, and I'm impressed they can get that much from the headless body of a person who died 6 months ago. How is there anything to criticise here?
mokgohan
I'm a little surprised that a foreigner has been missing in Japan since October and it hasn't been news at all, unless they were here illegally. Most people have at least a few friends or an employer who would've reported them missing to the local authorities.
Also, does it seem like the only way j-cops ever solve any crimes like these is when the guy walks into the statiion and confesses. And even then it takes them about 48 hours of polite questioning before they get around to releasing any actual info. The exception (due to international pressure) being Lindsey Hawker's case.
thepro
uhhh where is the 'foreigner' from?
BurakuminDes
Let's all pray this sub-human swings for this.
cechanju
She was Korean it said on the news. Presumably they could only have known that if he admitted it.
gogogo
What the hell, what country is she from? RIP
Himajin
Aspara, correct. Decomposition was quite advanced, fingerprints were impossible.
marialenit
Yeah. The killer was botherd by his concience that made him turn himself in to the police and surrender.
shufu
Quoting Mokgohan - "I'm a little surprised that a foreigner has been missing in Japan since October and it hasn't been news at all, unless they were here illegally. Most people have at least a few friends or an employer who would've reported them missing to the local authorities."
Are you really surprised? If It was a pretty caucasian I would have been surprised, but a Korean, Chinese, or Filipino national, Japanese just don't seem to care about. Its really sad...
masterkun05
Sexually frustrated as u are here and raped her and tried to hide the evidence. Simple stuff.
MeanRingo
‘‘Every night, I could hardly sleep because of the sensational media coverage of the incident,’’ Iinuma was quoted as telling the investigators.
Exactly what does he mean by sensational? Sick man.
Sarge
"a headless female corpse"
What the heck is wrong with some people?
tenguleavings
So, if there had been no "sensational" media coverage, he'd have slept like a baby, having decapitated a woman and done his proper duty of disposing of (most of) her body? Jeez, if only the media could be properly discreet and sedate in its reporting of a headless corpse in a suitcase.
usaexpat
Well what was he going to do? "No copper I don't anything about that headless stiff in my luggage. You don't think I put him there do you?"
Midnightpromise
Expat, He went to lost luggage to claim it....did you even read the story?
masterkun05
How do u fit a whole body into a suit case. Guess he can do the rubiks cube as well. Lucky they dont have the death penalty here now..............
vajra
How could she be looked upon as being foreign if she was in Japan ? Dispatch the sinner to hell where he belongs !
marialenit
MeanRingo.Hello buddy.Maybe what he mean by the sensation is that he cant sleep well thingking how he feels about the woman making sex with him while shes alive.