crime

Bodies of woman, 8-month-old son found in car in Gifu

37 Comments

Police in Takayama, Gifu Prefecture, said Sunday that the bodies of a 36-year-old woman and her 8-month-old son were found inside a car parked on a mountain road, in what appears to be a murder-suicide.

A passerby alerted police at around 5:50 p.m. Saturday, saying that a car was parked by the side of the road and the occupants were not moving, Fuji TV reported. The car, which was locked from the inside, was parked on a snow-covered road in Asahicho, police said. The woman was in the driver's seat while her son was in a child seat in the front passenger seat.

There were no signs of external injury on the child's body, but the woman appears to have stabbed herself. Police said autopsies will be conducted to determine the exact cause of death.

The woman and her son were reported missing by the woman's 46-year-old husband after he came home from work on Friday night. The man told police his wife had mentioned to him in the past that she was having difficulty with child-rearing and that she didn't care whether she lived or died.

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Speaking from experience it is anything but easy to get help with these things in Japan. After I had my daughter I had really bad post partum depression. My husband was incredibly busy with work so I hardly saw him every day and my mother in law was staying with me to 'help' but really all she was doing was criticizing every thing I did. Twice at my follow up appointments I mentioned I was depressed... The first time they told me to ganbatte and see how I was feeling in 6 months. 6 months later I mentioned that it was only getting worse so they told me they would get back with me about finding a therapist in my area. A few weeks later they called and said they couldn't find one and told me to call again if I was feeling 'blue'. I wasn't feeling blue, I was sickeningly depressed. I went to my regular doctor and mentioned how horrible I was feeling but he said he couldn't prescribe me any medication because I was breastfeeding. I told him I would stop just to get help and he basically told me my daughter needs to keep breastfeeding because otherwise she could end up obese in the future, get ill every month, etc. So I kept on breastfeeding and dealt with it. I barely left the house for the first year of her life, cried myself to sleep several times a week and gained a ton of weight. When I couldn't do it anymore I just broke down. I ended up finding a foreign therapist to speak with (though an hour and a half travel time for me) and was immediately put on antidepressants. The difference was like night and day. Just to see this therapist and get the medication costs a nearly 30,000 yen a month. It was so difficult for me just to get to that point and I'm not even Japanese. I had to push and push just to get any help and its not even covered by the national health insurance. Although I would never have hurt my daughter, I also am lucky enough to have the support of my husband, lucky enough to be financially stable, and lucky enough to not be indoctrinated into the social shame system here. Its easy enough to judge someone when you're on the outside looking in, but it doesn't help anything to just dismiss the woman as a cold hearted murderer. People with mental illness need help if these incidents have any chance of being prevented in the future.

14 ( +15 / -1 )

Smith, you don't know the woman, you don't know her circumstances or state of mind - you know nothing save 4 very short paragraphs on a news website. We don't know about the nature of her marriage and a whole load of other variables. Selfish? Worthless??!! Really?

Mental illness in it's various guises, stress etc pulls people outside of a normal frame of mind. Rational, logical though disappears and at that point they just can't be judged through the same lens.

8 ( +19 / -11 )

Smith

And yet it's okay to rush to her defence without knowing anything about her, right? If she's not "worthless", what is she? She said herself it doesn't matter if she died, then murdered her child as well. Would you call her hero?

Don't even try to formulate my argument to serve your own purposes. You have made all kinds of assumptions and value judgements about this woman based on very little, including a statement from her husband that cannot be refuted by the woman herself due to her death. You DON"T KNOW ANYTHING about the context and background at all and yet you have repeatedly called her worthless and selfish. You kicked the ball off here pal with your tone, and I take exception to your moral grandstanding and that you are trying to isolate the action itself from the extenuating circumstances. Reminds me of the Dark Ages.

It may turn out in the fullness of time that she is just a cold hearted selfish killer. But it may also turn out that there were a whole host of reasons why she was driven to this tragic act. Until then, judgement should be suspended imo.

Yep, I'm the villain. Not the murderer, her actions are 'tragic'.

Again, don't try to tweak my words to serve your own purposes. I said the story is a tragedy - entirely different thing.

8 ( +8 / -0 )

savethegaijin

Thank you for providing some real perspective, that's a brave and pertinent post. This is the kind of story that educates and informs.

Thumbs up from me.

6 ( +7 / -1 )

@smith... Tamarama's tone that you don't know the woman was very different to your reply. I don't think Tamarama was having a go at you. The Pity Party? I won't apologise for feeling pity for the child or mental illness. @Godfather... what's your solution? I'm sure we all consider the child in such cases. @Wc626... a general comment about Japanese mothers... is that what she was thinking? Getting back to the original posts: we can't make assumptions about the mother just by this article. I'm not defending the mother but calling her worthless and selfish doesn't help the problem. If a mother is having these thoughts should we just go up to her and say "snap out of it because you're just worthless and selfish"?

3 ( +3 / -0 )

@smith... Tamarama made a good point so for once could you put a sock in it!!

2 ( +8 / -6 )

People should stop using women as a means of increasing the birth rate. All these ridiculous comments like "oh there's minus 2 for Japan's birth rate" are unwarranted. Even if 1000 young people die today, there will be negligible differences to Japan's overall population.

Furthermore, stop blaming everything on the mother. Yes, there was a similar incident yesterday where another mother killed 2 of her children. They were most likely suffering from desperation brought on by either financial problems or high family pressure, or both.

It's not surprising that these incidents are becoming more and more common. Real household income shrunk massively in 2015 due to the weakening of the yen and Abenomic's anti-deflation drive.

Some of my friends in Japan are planning to leave soon because their wages are stagnating in yen terms (shrinking in dollar terms). It's just not economic to live in Japan anymore, and I'm not surprised that even Japanese people are now questioning their wages now. The Japanese are usually very resilient to changes like these, but there's only so much pressure they can handle.

It's a sad reality that people living in Japan are being failed by the Japanese government's pro-big business drive. Only the big corporations like Toyota, Sony and Mitsubishi are benefiting from Abenomics, while salarymen (including expats) are the victims of falling wages and rising prices of necessities. Once the 10% tax rise comes into effect soon, I think more people will leave Japan.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

I do take exception to people like you calling her 'worthless' without knowing anything of her situation or context though. "

And yet it's okay to rush to her defence without knowing anything about her, right?

Calling out someone for judging someone without enough evidence to be able to do so responsibly, is not the same as defending that someone. Tamarama wasn't saying that the woman isn't worthless, she was saying that you don't have enough information to know if she was.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

@smith ... of course these stories make us angry and sad. Tamarama suggested the issue of mental illness is much deeper than just flying off the handle and attacking the mother. This story just makes me sad. I don't think Tamarama deserved the reply "and you do" in reference to knowing the mother and situation. Like I said he made a good point.

1 ( +5 / -4 )

There is no excuse to kill a kid, your own child, and then to commit suicide. But most likely, this woman was suffering a degree of mental stress that none of here can imagine, a stress so severe that the only way out seemed to her, in her stressed out mind, was to go to that other world that Japanese believe in, and not to leave her son behind, so in classic Japanese spirituality where there is no heaven or hell, she took herself and her son to that "other place. " that is how she most likely set up the scenario to herself. Look at this from HER eyes, not your eyes. She is in a better place now, according to Japanese beliefs.

1 ( +4 / -3 )

Here we go again! I am rather new to this site, is this a pretty common occurrence in Japan? It seems at least once or twice a month this happens! My prayers go out to the family.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Burning debate between (mostly if not only) foreign people about Japan:

it is a tragedy because people could have been saved. It is not fate. a murder of innocent shall be condemned, nonetheless implication of mental health issues shall be understood Japan culture is far from being respectful of individuals (happy to be back in my European country for that) This cultural behaviour prevents further civilised development, IMHO

Ganbatte Japan, I am supporting you at my level, for real, and it is hard. RIP to the kid

1 ( +1 / -0 )

they down vote those who want justice for a 8 MONTH OLD BABY.

The person who killed the baby is dead. Exactly what kind of 'justice for the baby' would you like?

1 ( +2 / -1 )

I doubt very much you'd defend a father who did the same thing and claimed he was stressed out and couldn't deal with things.

Because, mental illness (as Tamarama has suggested) is the same as being stressed isn't it?

Maybe she was suffering from mental illness. Maybe she tried to talk to friends or colleagues about it. And maybe she was met with people with mental health problems are selfish and worthless.

Because although you may say there is help out there there's certainly no compassion in your post. Perhaps one day you'll reach rock bottom and understand that there is no black and white when you're there.

She killed her self and she killed her kid. The only way this will stop happening is if people try to understand it and try to put systems of support in place.

But yes a woman took her life and that of her child. And thas an absolute tragedy.

0 ( +7 / -7 )

There is help out there, scant as it is

Perhaps you could enlighten us. And what's the best approach to persuading a mother struggling to cope that she should see someone and not have to fear social death or a lifetime of shame?

0 ( +2 / -2 )

"the pity party is part of the problem"

Yes, it was called out YESTERDAY as a DAILY OCCURRENCE and yet the pity party have no shame and are doing it again...

It is very easy to deal with as long as you THINK ABOUT THE INNOCENT VICTIM... the eight-month-old child...

RIP Akachan!! :-(

0 ( +3 / -3 )

So why do you defend her and her actions? and please don't say you don't.

So, I've just double checked my post and, no, I didn't defend her actions. I do take exception to people like you calling her 'worthless' without knowing anything of her situation or context though. You are so keen to judge, so quick to condemn her to the eternal fires. What's your hurry?

This story is a tragedy - for both of them, but your lack of compassion is sad. The reality you seem unable to accept in all of this is that the truth is often not a matter of black and white, especially in cases of mental illness which I am betting is a factor here. But I'm very pleased to see that others are not so quick with the noose on JT.

0 ( +5 / -5 )

savethegaijin,

Thank you for your courage in sharing with us, as a non-native who knew that there was an alternative, there is a solution, and that there is no shame involved in your circumstances.

Too many suffer terrified, mute ignorance thanks to the terrifying, dumb ignorance of the herd.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrzMhU_4m-g

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Lots of argument here about how much help is available and how accessible that help is, etc. Also some, like Smith questioning the mother taking her child with her to death, with others saying she doesn't have the mental capacity to decide otherwise.

I just want to add to a comment about Japan being a rather uncompassinate society. Help may be scant, and even if offered and taken up, it is seen as a shame and the recipient labeled as 'weak'. This is not unique to Japan. Many Asian countries are similar in this regard. It is cultural more than anything else.

In my younger days, I tried to start a business and failed. Instead of encouragement and consolation, friends and family scorned, shamed and insulted me to various degrees, some done in passive-aggressive or backhanded compliment fashion. it scarred me for years to come and I feel like I never recovered from it.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Wow! A lot of heated exchanges in this thread! I too fail to understand why people can give sympathy to someone who kills their kids. If they want to kill themselves, fair enough, but not the kids! That just makes them a cold blooded murderer who killed a defenceless child (or children). They are the lowest scum of the earth! Everybody condemns any man that rapes or kills a girl on the street, but they defend mothers for killing their kids and have sympathy for them? Seriously? They are one in the same! The only difference is the circumstances, but the outcome is the same. That woman earlier this week that killed two of her kids but failed to kill the third and herself is a mass-murderer! They pull the depression and hardship card and get away with murder, literally! If the laws were more strict and the empathy was not so prevalent these murderers might think twice about killing their kids. I only have pity for the kids. The murderers can go to hell, where they belong!

0 ( +1 / -1 )

There needs to be a major mental health awareness movement in Japan. More than just awareness of illnesses, but stress the facts that people can receive help and will get better. I think most Japanese still believe having mental illness is a death sentence. I don't think they understand that with treatment they can live better lives. With proper counseling, and perhaps antidepressants, this woman and her child would have had a higher chance of living rather than no treatment at all. I hope an organization from another country will take action there soon.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

@JonathanPrin " Burning debate between (mostly if not only) foreign people about Japan" ...? It is an English language Japanese news site and perhaps not for you but for many on here Japan is home, therefore, there are many tragic stories that may ring true to many and so the debate.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

I have been so sick hearing and reading about mothers/ parents murdering their own child/children. My heart fell for these little innocent babies. May they rest in eternal peace.

The truth really stings. Many Japanese citizens really have problems in dealing stress and end up killing themselves or their family! WTF! WHATTAH FOLLISH DEED! Why on earth these people put really little value on LIFE? It is unthinkable! GROW UP PLEASE! STOP MAKING BABIES IF YOU CAN'T BEAR THEM!

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Sad,babies and kids are the most beautiful creature to a parent,I'm a mother of four and near the same age as her.My husband has changed eversince we came to Japan.There were times that I pinched my own child because of stress and the burden of a sole bread winner but I can never imagine doing that,no excuse for her actions.

If someone is going through difficult times,help is available at the local city office,kadomo centre..something like that. When my husband was verbally abusive to the kids, which he does when he needs money.I spoke to them,although I didn;t want them to come at our apartment immediately,they know how not to embarrass you to your neighborhood and offered advice on my options if it escalates.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

There is only one excuse: insanity

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

And, another selfish, worthless mom decides that she better murder her child when taking herself out. I guess it's a daily thing now, although the one yesterday just saw that she would get instant pity if she murdered a kid and turned herself in instead.

Agree Smith., The population is decreasing. If this selfish mum spared her child, it might've been adopted and given a shot in Japan.

Why do japanese women think only "they" can be the best mothers to their own infants? This thinking is so wrong. But its part of japanese culture because they like to burden anyone with the raising of an innocent 8 mo. infant. Pathetic-

-2 ( +5 / -7 )

What I find absolutley unbelievable in this community of Japantoday readers who post here and on other similar articles, is how they down vote those who want justice for a 8 MONTH OLD BABY.

I'd love to hear the argument that this woman was not selfish in the killing of an innocent child, a BABY for that matter. Leave the child at a care center? With friends, relatives? Ensure your OWN CHILD is taken care of then feel free to take your own life.

No matter how stressed you are, how much life sucks, how useless your husband is - you have no right whatsoever to take the life of a child who cannot speak for him/herself.

This woman, and others like her in this country went from tragic victim of an oppressive life/relationship whatever, to a useless piece of trash after taking the life of a baby.

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

I think nobody truly understand the Japan and these Japanese. As I have live in Japan more than 25 years so I don't mind saying this: Here in Japan there is no humanity. Lack of loving-kindness, philosophy and spirituality, people here only follow what they know as the policeman's morality. The police and the prison keep these left over people free from their jails. I need to work hard to bring humanity to Japan.

-3 ( +1 / -4 )

I'd love to hear the argument that this woman was not selfish in the killing of an innocent child, a BABY for that matter.

It it was mental illness, where she was unable to differentiate between right and wrong, then it wouldn't be selfishness, it would be insanity.

No matter how stressed you are, how much life sucks, how useless your husband is - you have no right whatsoever to take the life of a child who cannot speak for him/herself.

You're right, and anyone who isn't insane deserves ultimate condemnation for it. But that's the first thing that needs to be identified - whether or not the woman was insane.

-3 ( +0 / -3 )

Heda_Madness: "I doubt very much you'd defend a father who did the same thing and claimed he was stressed out and couldn't deal with things. Because, mental illness (as Tamarama has suggested) is the same as being stressed isn't it?"

Do you defend the woman who murdered her daughter yesterday because she was stressed out, and also tried to kill her son? I bet you you do. I bet suddenly it's "different".

Tamarama: "I do take exception to people like you calling her 'worthless' without knowing anything of her situation or context though. "

And yet it's okay to rush to her defence without knowing anything about her, right? If she's not "worthless", what is she? She said herself it doesn't matter if she died, then murdered her child as well. Would you call her hero? A veritable bastion of use to society -- a society that, by the way, needs kids more than ever. What we know, beyond the shadow of a doubt, is she murdered her child and then herself. If you want to wait and hope you can pin it on mental illness later, be my guest. I don't defend murderers, nor do I commit to double standards when it's a woman.

"This story is a tragedy - for both of them, but your lack of compassion is sad."

Yep, I'm the villain. Not the murderer, her actions are 'tragic'. Sorry, I don't feel sorry for murderers, regardless of the reasons or who is doing the killing.

Wc626: "Agree Smith., The population is decreasing. If this selfish mum spared her child, it might've been adopted and given a shot in Japan."

Precisely! But putting aside depopulation for a moment, it's despicable that people will try and say she is not worthless, or not a coward, or that it's not her fault. Meanwhile, we have to read about it (and their contradictions as the case differed slightly) day in, day out.

Shame on this woman.

-4 ( +5 / -9 )

roosterman77: " I don't think Tamarama deserved the reply "and you do" in reference to knowing the mother and situation."

Why not? If one of her biggest points against me is that I don't know the woman or her situation, what is the problem with pointing out that neither does she, and yet despite that she thinks the woman deserves pity.

BS. It is or it is not relevant. It isn't irrelevant today that other murderers suffer from stress and commit acts and people support them if a woman because this woman was 'mentally ill', then point out the woman yesterday, whom none of us also know anything about save that she murdered her kids, did it because she is "stressed out and can't cope".

(from yesterday's article); "Meanwhile, a child welfare center in Atsugi said the woman has consulted them at the end of last year, saying she was feeling the strain of rearing three children."

So, stress. But Heda_madness says, "because stress and mental illness are the same" in an attempt to discredit the argument, but actually discrediting his own.

It is a shame that she felt so low to the point that she thought she needed to end her own life. Taking others with her is deplorable. If you don't think she's a selfish coward, find a way to ask the kid if he's happy he's dead and the mother was indeed 'saving him', or whatever excuse murderers give.

-5 ( +7 / -12 )

roosterman77: "@smith... Tamarama made a good point so for once could you put a sock in it!!"

What good point? I said the man or woman, teenager or senior, killing someone is WRONG and deserves punishment. There is absolutely NO questioning that this woman took her child's life, is there? And yet, in her biggest defence of the woman and the murder she, like many others, automatically jump on when it's a woman and say, "Hey, wait a minute! You have no idea what this woman was like or the struggles she face," despite the fact that neither do they. It's this automatically jumping on and saying "we can't see a different state of mind under the same lens" that is a HUGE problem when it comes to being anything other than a woman killing her kids. The child's murder is tragic, her mother's killing him were NOT -- and yet you guys defend it time and again, only yesterday doing so as well and with me saying as long as we pity them they will continue to see it as an easy solution, when so many other struggling mothers don't commit murder.

Do you support a man who goes on a gun rampage, killing others at his former place of employment because he was fired? Why not? We can't know his mainframe, right? Maybe he was mentally ill and being screwed by the system. Do you support the guy who massacred people outside of the Planned Parenthood clinic? Why not? He was clearly mentally ill. Do you support an alcoholic -- proven to be a disease -- he is in a 'different mainframe' and goes out driving and killing people? No? Why not?

Heda_Madness: "Because, mental illness (as Tamarama has suggested) is the same as being stressed isn't it?"

Deflecting. You know full well there are a list of claimed mental disorders that are associated with stress. Panic attacks, anxiety disorder, and you can also call depression 'chronic' or claim to defend people, or realise that some people just get bummed out and can't deal with it -- like if they're favourite team loses and they go nuts. Weak, my friend.

"Maybe she tried to talk to friends or colleagues about it. And maybe she was met with people with mental health problems are selfish and worthless."

I've already said that's another problem. So defend the woman killing the kid and suggesting it's not her fault and that we can't judge her? There's not enough help out there -- I've said it time and again, and even pointed to the father asking what he did when he heard. If he tried to get her help, and she murdered the child and killed herself to run away, that's entirely HER problem. The people who deserve to be pitied are those who suffer through it, get help, and survive and not kill others. Then they deserve just credit for their hard work.

You guys popping on here and saying, "Well, wait, you have no idea what she was thinking but I know for a fact she was mentally ill, and while it is 'tragic' what happened, it was certainly not the woman's fault.

You guys know squat, save that she murdered her own child in a selfish act that can never be taken back. That lies on HER. She was too much of a coward to stay it out like the thousands and thousands of other women who do (IF she was sick), proves that.

"The only way this will stop happening is if people try to understand it and try to put systems of support in place."

Many have, and have not killed their kids. Sorry, bud, but the pity party is part of the problem.

-6 ( +7 / -13 )

Smith - you are absolutely right. This was a spiteful, selfish and senseless murder of an innocent.

No doubt the mother had some problems. Gee, I wonder what that feels like, having problems?

Not everyone chooses to sort their problems out by murdering a child. And those who do, deserve condemnation. Those who defend the murderer need to ask themselves some questions.

-8 ( +2 / -10 )

And, another selfish, worthless mom decides that she better murder her child when taking herself out. I guess it's a daily thing now, although the one yesterday just saw that she would get instant pity if she murdered a kid and turned herself in instead.

"The man told police his wife had mentioned to him in the past that she was having difficult with child-rearing and that she didn’t care whether she lived or died."

So, what did the man do about it? If he did nothing then there is rationale for pitying the woman for wanting to commit suicide as a way out. Not for killing the kid, though. There is help out there, scant as it is. Not everyone with problems kills their children. The government needs to be more aggressive in letting people know that it's okay to seek help, and DEFINITELY needs to be better about actually providing it without any stigma attached. If you know someone who is having trouble, PLEASE try to help them, or at least try to get them to get help.

But, sorry, no pity for the murder. So, go ahead and thumb me down; say, "There's no excusing what she did, for sure! but we have to excuse what she did because it's not her fault", etc., etc., that is helping this LITERALLY happen daily.

-9 ( +12 / -21 )

No excuse to kill the kid. None!

-9 ( +3 / -12 )

Tamarama: "Smith, you don't know the woman, you don't know her circumstances or state of mind"

Ah, but you do, right? Here's what we know for sure: she murdered her child. So why do you defend her and her actions? and please don't say you don't. I doubt very much you'd defend a father who did the same thing and claimed he was stressed out and couldn't deal with things.

-10 ( +11 / -21 )

Look at this from HER eyes, not your eyes.

Perhaps, but one could say that about any murder. I still think there is now excuse to kill a child like that.

-11 ( +1 / -12 )

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