Police said Wednesday they have arrested a man over the murder of his sister and the attempted murder of his mother at their home in Nara a day after being released from prison.
According to police, 35-year-old Toshito Hatanaka was arrested three years ago for slashing a police officer with a knife. Fuji TV reported that he was released on Aug 25 and visited his mother's house on Aug 26 at around 3:30 p.m. Shortly thereafter, Hatanaka contacted police to report that he had slashed his mother and sister with a kitchen knife.
Police arrived at the scene to find Hatanaka's 40-year-old sister Miki Hatanaka had sustained stab wounds to her back and abdomen and his 60-year-old mother had also been stabbed in the abdomen. Police say Hatanaka's sister died of her injuries in hospital and that his mother remains in critical condition.
During police questioning, Hatanaka was quoted by police as saying, "I got angry when my mother said she couldn't let me stay at her place."
© Japan Today
40 Comments
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Harry_Gatto
Who decided that this lunatic was fit for release?
borax
Seriously...if he's so unstable that being refused by his mother drove him to homicide, that should have been VERY easy to spot before his parole.
Kapuna
Does Japan have a Mental Health program? If so, it really needs revamping.
Jeff Ogrisseg
This is called "recidivism" (a tendency to relapse into a previous condition or mode of behavior; especially: relapse into criminal behavior).
I guess we know where he'll be staying tonight, and every night for a while.
Get Real
Only three years for stabbing a cop?
WilliB
What a piece of work. This time throw away the key!
BurakuminDes
Is there a possibility he may now be executed? - surely then he won't kill and injure yet more innocent victims.
sensei258
“I got angry when my mother said she couldn’t let me stay at her place.” Now you know why moron.
Mirai Hayashi
That's what you get when you give people a slap on the wrist for serious crimes.
Elbuda Mexicano
What a horrible, twisted, sick SOB!! No offense to his own mother, but this rotten bastard needs to HANG!! and ASAP!! RIP poor sister of this sick low down no good bastard criminal dog!
isoducky
Everyone is looking at him saying he is crazy, I wonder what happened to the system of having a place for the guy to go after being released. I think the state is primarily at fault here.
StormR
Not sure if mental eveluation is carried out here on convicts when first recieved into the institution they are going to spend there sentence but there surely must be some sort of evaluation done as this type of scum bag needs to be assessed before being released into the community.
Stabbing a policeman would surely ring some alarm bells that the guy is unstable, and now because of some lax inefficient system he has now slashed his mother and murdered his sister, I hope those who over saw this guy during his last sentence can see the red flags here.
Anyone charged with a violent crime needs a pyshc analysis upon beginning their sentence, everyone gets angry from time to time but most of us control the raging feelings enough not to slash stab murder and kill coz we cant control our selfishness.
The Chronic
This is a prime example of what I talked about before in another post about how when these animals are released, they end up committing yet another crime. In this case murdering his own sister and possibly his own mother. These types of people have no right walking the earth.
Put this animal down like a rabid dog.
Tiger_In_The_Hermitage
The best place for him to reside is in prison.
TheDevilsAssistant
I guess he realized that it would be difficult to get a job to eat and pay for rent. So now he gets it free.
jumpultimatestars
I know nobody here will want to hear this, but for a moment let's try to see this from the perpetrator's perspective; Until we understand why people do what they do they'll never stop doing it. Imagine what it would it feel like to be separated from your family and everyone who cares about you for 3 long years, and having to endure the total hell that is a Japanese prison, alone. When you're finally released, you're desperate to turn to the only ones you know who still care about you, who will still be there for you, your only connection left in this world. But then you suddenly find out that they've grown cold, withdrawn and judge you for becoming a criminal, never to look at you with caring eyes again and won't even let you stay in the same house.
That unfathomable realization that the entire world despises, your worthless existence a burden, could be understandably maddening. I've never had to deal with that, luckily, and from my priviledged position if I were to judge this person without knowing how it feels I would be quite ignorant indeed.
slumdog
Actually, let's look at it from the mother's and sister's perspective. Their son/brother is arrested, convicted and jailed for attacking, stabbing and slightly injurying someone in 2010. Imagine how frightened you would be of that person coming to live with you. Then imagine the horro at the thing you have feared happening for three years coming true.
http://www.ktv.jp/news/date/20130826.html
StormR
jumpultimatestars
Us understanding why these nut jobs strike will not stop them from killing, They need to understand NOT US.
No sympathy for these low scum bgas, the whole reason they do things like this is because they Lack Self Control they are weak, It Is That Simple.
Dennis Bauer
@jumpultimatestars
So the natural reaction is to stab your family instead of bearing and find your own place?
Offwithyourarrogance
3 years for attempted murder on a cop..makes sense. Actually how can you be released without a mental evaluation? Forgot it doesnt exist here!
wtfjapan
Does Japan have a Mental Health program? if it did then the suicide rate wouldnt be so high
jumpultimatestars
@slumdog we dont need to review the victim's perspective here because we all naturally sympathize with victim in the face of such a horrid crime from the start. Their horror is clear. The challenging part for us then is to think of the monster as an actual human, because by all genetic rights he still technically is, despite the atrocities.
@Dennis For us it isn't, but for him it evidently was.
@Storm In the face of a grave problem would you trust and ask for a demented individual to resolve it and figure it out for themselves, or would you rather split that responsibility with people like ourselves who have our brains in working order? By attempting to think outside our own little boxes (i.e. the perpetrator's perspective), we can evaluate more clearly if and how the whole situation could have been avoided, and what the warning signs were.
Erik Jacobs
3 years for stabbing an officer? Sounds like Japans justice system is quite simular to the Dutch.
slumdog
You are mistaken in thinking that the victimization of the mother and sister started when they were attacked. It did not. As I wrote, it started the day this man decided to attack another human in 2010 and lasted for the more than three years since then until he arrived at the mother's home and stabbed them. It was attempted murder three years ago and was attempted murder this time, too. Think about the three years waiting for this man to get out, probably knowing he would come to their home and what he might do, and did end up doing. Thinking of him as a human does not take the responsibility for what he has done away.
If you are saying more should be done to examine and evaluate such cases, I agree. It is important for the government to do as much as they can to help the ones that can rehabilitate get the treatment they need. I agree. But, first and foremost, the victims deserve our thoughts.
CalvinMontblanc
Hard to say if a psyche eval would have turned up anything. Saying otherwise is simply application of 20/20 hindsight. I could see someone originally guilty of a non-violent crime snapping when finally getting of prison and have his own mother turn him away.
A big problem here might just be a failure in the psyche eval, or lack of, but I also have to wonder if anyone bothered to ensure he had a place to stay once out of prison. Having people leave prison only to sleep on park benches is bound to be a problem regardless.
Jaeae An
I mean this guy does have a major anger problem but look at how he has been treated by everyone as, socially rejected criminal who is not even welcomed by his family members. The society needs to learn how to embrace different behaviors to some degree.
avigator
No love, and difficult days to deal with.
RedMars
They just released an Incredible Hulk from a prison!
"Mister, you won't like me when I am angry!
Joel Lim
Self-made "Freedom short-lived"
What's becoming to human like us nowadays! I feel sad there is no loves from all related parties anyway!
I guess this Hulk should never be released in the first place!
isoducky
I'm not going to bother about the time the man spent in jail, because it could have been 7, 10, or 15 years, the result likely would have been the same. The guy said 'I got angry when my mother said she couldn't let me stay at her place'.
Questions have to be raised, after three years of incarceration why was this person released to his family if his family had no intentions of keeping him? If his family lied about their intentions to keep him, what (if any) pressure was pressed upon the family? The latter is a failure of the system, if it shown that the family was pressured in to taking the man. Finally, what (if any) alternatives were presented to everyone if the family could not take the man?
He was released 1 day, then committed a crime. If he was informed he couldn't live at his mother's house, why was their no police intervention till after this tragic incident? There are too many questions to be asked before calling the man nutter.
ham21
Excuse me, how old is this man?(35) Just when is it time to take personal responsibility? This person, as others have said, needed to be examined before release, if he wasn't. As was also stated, his condition may or may not have been revealed. However, he spent the prescribed time for his previous crime and was due release. This monster made his choices. Now it's up to the authorities to make sure his does not have the opportunity to kill again! May his sister RIP.
hikkifan17
Just because your own mother told you that you cannot stay at her place does not give you right to stab your family members. I cannot believe he stabbed his sister and now she is dead and his mother is in critical condition.
Did he not learn anything in prison? This bastard belongs in the cage for the rest of his life and he will regret doing such thing to his family. ROT IN PRISON YOU MURDERER!
CalvinMontblanc
You know, its easy to imagine that he stabbed his sister out of pure malice, since no other details are provided. But a lot of things could have happened. I have a sister and I tell you, nobody knows how to push my buttons like she does. Not to defend his actions at all, but we don't know how the sister got involved. She may have involved herself, and in such a way that got the stabby ball rolling.
Gengar
Back to jail! For life this time.
AramaTaihenNoYouDidnt
If he never got any family visits from his mother and/or sister...well, enough said, I guess. He should have known better than to ask. Here in Japan, family, groups, society s a whole will always finger your shame!!
almxxx
No amount of study will ever prevent events like this from happening. How could anyone know they were going to be raising a killer? In my opinion, things like this happen because we are living out perfect justice here on space prison...planet Earth. Why do we all suffer in life? How can we be unhappy even when wealthy and healthy? When we are growing up, why are we always "trying to find ourselves"? After a life of paid slavery and dedication why do we face long suffering illnesses before death? Why does mankind constantly face the same problems century after century? Repeated wars and political systems that are corrupt and remain in power? Death would mark the successful completion of our sentence.
JeanValJean
What a piece of work. Can't say what I really think of such a SOS(sack of suds). Horrible!
I'm A Monkey
Thanks for your kind, human perspective jumpultimatestars.
Thanks for yours, slumdog especially @8:35PM.
Thanks for the funny, RedMars.
CalvinMonntblanc, I think, I know that you don't have a stabby ball. Just use the phone.
Good one, almxxx. Pretty super.
And les miserable, what's happened? Ya homeless now?
I'm A Monkey thinks, the mother and sister could have had money for him to get re-started. And a cheap place to rent. Money would have helped. Money...... That's the human way...... Gimme a banana.
ham21
Calvin- Maybe she tried to defend HER MOM?
602miko
And this time for how many years? I think if they don't want to stay him atlease they must give him a proper house, to support him untill he can recover and found a better job. Maybe they treat him like a intruder?