crime

Man arrested over murder of Osaka karaoke parlor owner

16 Comments

Police in Osaka on Friday night arrested a 56-year-old man on suspicion of killing a 25-year-old woman at the karaoke parlor she owned.

Hiroshi Miyamoto, a company employee from Nishinomiya in Hyogo Prefecture, is accused of killing Mayuko Inada whose body was found at around 10:45 a.m. last Monday at her Gomachan karaoke parlor on the fifth floor of a commercial building in Tenjinbashi, Kita Ward, Fuji TV reported. Police said Miyamoto, who was a regular customer at the karaoke parlor, has admitted going to the parlor on the night of June 11 but denied killing Inada. Inada was stabbed at least 10 times in the chest and neck.

A male friend of Inada, worried at not having heard from her, went to the building on Monday and spoke to a woman who runs a coffee shop on the first floor. The woman, who was also a close friend of the Inada, has a master key to the karaoke parlor. She and the man went up to the fifth floor and let themselves into the locked karaoke parlor. After finding Inada’s body, the woman called 110.

No weapon was found at the scene of the crime. Police said building surveillance camera footage showed Inada going into the building at around 5 p.m. on June 11 but there was no footage showing her leaving the building.

Police said Miyamoto regularly frequented the karaoke parlor where Inada used to work for four years up until January when she opened Gomachan.

According to media reports, Inada had told acquaintance she was having trouble with Miyamoto who was constantly making advances toward her. Miyamoto is married, police said.

Police suspect Miyamoto may have waited until other customers left, killed Inada, then locked the karaoke parlor and took the key with him.

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16 Comments
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It really is disturbing, how many women are murdered every week by some evil guy with a mental problem.

You simply have to be unlucky enough to have crossed paths for some unfortunate people.

He really should be given solitary for a few years and then death.

4 ( +10 / -6 )

Glad they got the guy, and unsurprisingly it was a stalker and nothing to do with those dreaded "yakuza" that some people always bring up.

2 ( +7 / -5 )

Agreed @personiamnow 4:13pm. Let’s never forget the victim. Her simple dream to bring some happiness to other people, ended by someone else’s selfishness. Little solace from his capture for her family and friends. Yet, Maybe this young woman can eventually “Rest In Peace” once justice is fittingly served.

1 ( +2 / -1 )

Karaoke bars usually have surveillance cameras everywhere.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

@igfklin

Actually, I think that they prosecute more than 8% of murder cases in the UK.

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

8% is the total prosecution rate for all crimes, murder tends to be heavily investigated and so a large number, but not all lead to prosecution. Unlike Japan we don’t have a 99% conviction rate!

Murder investigations are complex and time consuming so the conviction rate per year does not relate. Murderers are caught and convicted sometimes decades after the crime as procedures and technology improves, the cases are never closed.

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

quercetum

Karaoke bars usually have surveillance cameras everywhere.

Err, really? Not the ones I have been to (and that is a lot). If you mean the building entrance, yes obviously, it is mentioned in the article too.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

This thug took the life of a motivated hard working woman who wanted to build a future for herself and those around her, she will RIP and be in a better place that what this killer intended to send her to.

I hope he gets the rope with a very very long drop.

2 ( +4 / -2 )

Shaking his head; not in disbelief and incomprehension, because such incidents are now a dime a dozen. But out of the deepest pity for Mayuko; harassed for years by this arrogant psychopath, nurturing and consumed by dreams of revenge for all those perceived slights and rebuffed advances which prefigured this grisly denouement, this brutal end to her life and dreams. The entitled, misogynist attitudes he and others like him still cleave to are in need of a thorough Augean cleansing.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

CaptDingleheimer

I feel him.

The one and only time I got arrested in Japan was for assault and battery on a karaoke owner...

FYI - This is not the cool story you seem to think it is.

5 ( +6 / -1 )

She apparently had problems with this obsessed customer.

Another deranged loved obsessed guy who couldn't let it go. RIP.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

It really is disturbing, how many women are murdered every week by some evil guy with a mental problem.

How many?

0 ( +2 / -2 )

It really is disturbing, how many women are murdered every week by some evil guy with a mental problem.

In Japan alone or worldwide?

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Since she was likely killed on the 11th and her body wasn’t found until the 14th...check his movements over the weekend. Since he went there every day he certainly would have come by...unless he didn’t because he knew she was dead.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

oldman

She apparently had problems with this obsessed customer.

Another deranged loved obsessed guy who couldn't let it go. RIP.

It is tricky. He denies he did it. While I believe he did, it is up to the police to prove it.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

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