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Police in Tokyo on Saturday arrested a 36-year-old unemployed man on suspicion of killing his 75-year-old ailing mother at their home in Edogawa Ward on Friday.
According to police, Masayuki Mogami has admitted to killing his mother, Kazuko Mogami, who was found by her eldest daughter at around 5:30 p.m. on Friday, Kyodo News reported. She was lying on a futon and had been strangled to death with a towel, police said.
Mogami lived in the residence with her husband, son and daughter. Her husband and daughter were not home that afternoon. The daughter told police she received a text message from her brother in which he said he had killed their mother.
Mogami was arrested at around 2 p.m. on Saturday afternoon at Higashi-Ojima Station in Tokyo.
The victim has suffered a debilitating disease for several years. Mogami was quoted by police as saying he was worn out from looking after his mother, as his sister worked during the day.
© Japan Today
11 Comments
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Jonathan Prin
Sad.
I don´t judge in this case.
Alongfortheride
A good argument for euthanasia laws to change.
Ken Holcomb
Got to wonder if mom ever felt "worn out" from looking after her selfish son whenever he was sick while still a child. I would have wrote 'while growing up', but it's obvious he never did.
And no,
this is most definitely NOT a good argument for euthanasia. There is nothing in the article that hints the mother wished to die.
What this case, and the many others like it highlighted on this site, might be a good argument for is a more available and affordable hospice service in Japan.
Hikikomorii
Makes me wonder how much love the mother gave the son for him to grow and become a monster. Is the son too ill mentally to be able to contain his stress and not to put an end to the root cause of his stress? Love from both ends would have prevented this, and it's apparent that there wasn't enough of it.
Peppe
RIP . If you have a mother or father or son in not good condition pray to get better soon , help to keep alive your love ones as long as possible , let decide the God when is the time to go .
diagonalslip
isn't kaigo hoken (介護保険) designed to offer support of one sort and another in this sort of situation? I've yet to meet anyone who has benefitted from their hefty payments for same, even those who could use some help.
Gaijinjland
No judgment here. Only speculation. Asian families are controlling. Maybe the sister made a better salary and the brother volunteered (forced) to quit his lower paying job to care for the mother full time and finally snapped. You really shouldn’t live with your parents after a certain age unless absolutely necessary. It can turn toxic. If you’re parents need care, send them to an assisted living facility. If you can’t afford that, live close by but not in the same home.
oyatoi
Hardly a day goes by here without hearing yet another story about a child offing a parent. It’s an issue deserving of far greater acknowledgement. The makers of those community service (A.C) commercials need to drop whatever else they’re doing and begin to grapple with a problem that is only going to worsen in future, in sync with the burgeoning number of elderly. Japanese society's ostrich-like propensity to shirankao out of existence anything which sheds an unsavoury light, needs to be confronted head on.
Dave Fair
My 86 year old mother-in-law who has Alzheimer's disease stays with us as she cannot be left alone! Honestly, it takes a lot out of us and puts a HUGE strain on our marriage. She can't even sleep alone as she wakes up during the middle of the night and will turn on the tv, volume up, or has gone outside and gets lost or will try to make some tea on the gas range and we worry she will burn the house down! So I sleep with the dog and my wife stays downstairs and sleeps on the sofa with one eye open. She sh*ts herself quite regularly which means EVERYTHING stops and the cleanup process begins with my wife taking her in the shower and I washing her clothes and the sofa or chair she was sitting on.
And it doesn't get any better, it just gets more difficult with each passing day! And if she isn't trying to resist taking a bath, changing her clothes, brushing her teeth or any of the other things that need to get done, she just says "yada" like a 2 year old. So for those of you who pass judgement on individuals who can't take it anymore, remember what a wise man once said, “Don't judge a man until you've walked a mile in their shoes.” or have had to take care of a sick elderly relative who doesn't even remember who you are anymore.
Alex
The saddest part is that this exact story is like a daily occurrence here now. In a country with an aging population and a desperate need for more young people, who would even want to have children when the chances of them killing you in the future seems to grow every single day?
keech2
@peppe
What you are saying is the problem. A longer life doesn't mean a better life. If the god you are talking about was merciful, no one would be in such a situation.
@Dave Fair
I understand completely. My wife has a terminal disease and I've watched her just slowly disappear for the last 15 years. We have worked with her doctors, nurses and other caregivers to create a care program. We did not have to be forceful, just had to talk with them and come to an agreement about what was possible and what we wanted. We've got a lot of care, but there is a limit and I do wish that there was more available.
Many other families won't bring up the topic with their doctors and won't accept help even when it's offered. It's very hard to admit that you can't care for a loved one. And, while I'd never take that way out, I can understand why others do it. People who do this are usually not monsters, but simply people who see no other way out.