crime

Man arrested after attacking woman, child with metal bat

25 Comments

A man with a metal bat attacked a woman and a child at JR Tennoji Station in Osaka on Wednesday afternoon.

Police said they received calls from people at the station at around 5:30 p.m., saying that a man was wielding a bat. Fuji TV reported that the suspect, an unemployed 41-year-old man identified as Masafumi Matsumoto, used the 80-cm-long bat to hit a 22-year-old woman twice and then hit a six-year-old girl nearby.

Police rushed to the scene and restrained Matsumoto. The woman and the child were taken to hospital with arm and head injuries.

On Thursday, police quoted Matsumoto as saying he didn't know the woman or child. He said the woman bumped into his shoulder and didn't apologize. He said he then lost his temper because he didn't like the way the woman stared at him.

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25 Comments
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Tennoji. Surprise, surprise.

-6 ( +3 / -9 )

Jesus wept! First the nutter blatting the poor woman the other day with a bat, and now this freak beating a woman and a CHILD...

He said he then lost his temper because he didn’t like the way the woman stared at him.

And he just so happened to be carrying a metal baseball bat. Aye, right! This is GBH at the very least... I mean getting mad because of the perceived way someone was looking at him?

Lock him up... ABH, assault with a deadly weapon, anything... just get him off the streets.

9 ( +10 / -1 )

Yeah right!! Someone bumps into you and upsets you, BUT you have a bat ready to batter them with? As a Osaka native and resident this guy pisses me off. He should be charged with attempted murder of a child by swinging a metal pole at a six year old.

16 ( +17 / -1 )

Just hoping the poor innocent victims are going to be OK, physically and mentally.

As for the scumbag coward who did this - he has forfeited any right to live in civil society. Put the worthless trash away forever. I bet without his bat and when he is up against men - hardened crims - in the slammer he wont be so "tough" anymore...

0 ( +3 / -3 )

"Wow, I'm unemployed and it's getting cold. How can I get free room and board? Oh I know, I'll whack somebody with my bat. But, I'd better attack women and children cuz I don't want to get my ass kicked in the process"

-1 ( +4 / -5 )

Elsewhere he could have been arrested simply for carrying an offensive weapon. Another psychiatric case off his medication?

1 ( +3 / -2 )

Sounds absolutely crazy!

1 ( +3 / -2 )

Paranoia is getting best of them this age...

0 ( +2 / -2 )

What a bully!

1 ( +3 / -2 )

Safety Japan! What's with these lunatics? I guess from now on if you see someone walking around with a bat you have to prepare for the worst.

-3 ( +3 / -6 )

Another day, another violent attack. Violent crime is on the rise in Japan, and can't simply be brushed off by blaming it on those 'weird' Japanese males. Ideally, concealed weapons would have prevented this attack, even something like pepper spray.

-11 ( +1 / -12 )

For all the crowding and jostling that is a feature of life in Japan, rage of this sort is thankfully quite rare. When it does happen however, we see the cultural predilection for helplessness instead of courage and improvisation. Were there no big boys around, two of whom working in concert could've easily taken him down long before the keystones arrived on the scene?

0 ( +2 / -2 )

Wow, I wished I had bumped into him!! He would have been chewing the metal and spitting out teeth. I can't believe that no men in the area of the attack would not step in and take the idiot down!

1 ( +5 / -4 )

@ misunderstood.

Totally agree, but you used the word "men" from my own experience (3 times in 2 yrs, got a horrid late night okonomiaki near my house) with guys beating their girl friends drunk and ive tried to get J males to help me out they always run for cover and dont want to get involved. Pathetic.

0 ( +2 / -2 )

Mental issues.

0 ( +2 / -2 )

Taking her anger out on women and children? How much of a coward are you?

1 ( +2 / -1 )

Two bat attacks in a short period of time, maybe its time to ban the bat?

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

Why attack women and children? Because they are "soft targets", meaning there is a high probability of being successful with little or no risk to the attacker.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

He said the woman bumped into his shoulder and didn’t apologize. He said he then lost his temper because he didn’t like the way the woman stared at him.

So you take a bat to a woman and a small child?? And what did the child do to you? Give him 20 years. He could have easily killed these 2 people.

1 ( +2 / -1 )

Bat beating for a woman who bumped his shoulders and for the child who happens to be there, what more if someone mistakenly stepped on his foot or pushed him by accident : (

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Japanese media reports

His neighbours often heard the noise, he bangs around and shouts loudly Hey Do you want to Die?! Then, police soon called try to check inside his room to always find out nobody else but himself

Mental disorder. Too many of this kind these days. Why?

-2 ( +2 / -4 )

Maybe time for J police to become more proactive... go out on foot patrol, look out for the potential trouble before it starts... don't just sit in kobans and only reacting after the assailant has long fled. Reassure the population that they are being protected by their local plod.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

@ Thunderbird

How about starting at the root of the cause, the total lack of emotional understanding and control. The japanese word for empathy is a dead word in my experience.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

Kobe, I wouldn't want to insult my Japanese friends by implying they have no empathy.

I still think foot patrols would allow then police to spot these nutters before they attack... I mean some outraged bloke not in baseball gear wandering around with a baseball bat would immediately strike me as odd, so if I was a copper I would ask him why he was carrying such an instrument, and if I didn't get a satisfactory answer it be radio time and calling up a patrol car or van to take him in for questioning. How hard would that be?

2 ( +2 / -0 )

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