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The Chiba District Court has sentenced a 49-year-old man to 21 years in prison for fatally stabbing his 32-year-old wife in 2020, even though her body has never been found.
In handing down the ruling against Akira Ono, who lived in Tsukuba, Ibaraki Prefecture, Presiding Judge Yoshihisa Nakao said that Ono was in a bitter dispute with his estranged wife Rina, who lived in Inzai, Chiba Prefecture, over custody of their eldest son and felt his life would be ruined because of his inability to pay child support, Sankei Shimbun reported. The couple had been separated for two years prior to Rina’s disappearance in March 2020.
After he was arrested in November 2020, Ono told police he was having a heated argument with his wife in her car when she suddenly pulled out a box cutter knife. The two subsequently got into a scuffle. Ono claimed he accidentally stabbed Rina in the neck but denied intent to kill her. He said he buried Rina’s body at a beach in Hokota, Ibaraki Prefecture. But he later recanted his statement. Police searched the beach but were unable to find Rina’s body.
After Ono's arrest, police searched his residence and found Rina’s driver’s license and blood-stained hair follicles which a DNA test revealed to be the missing woman’s.
During the trial, prosecutors said that bloodstains in the car, which was found abandoned at a park in Narita, Chiba Prefecture, indicated a frenzied stabbing attack.
© Japan Today
11 Comments
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Cheradenine Zakalwe
Guilty or innocent, in the absence of habeas corpus there could be unexpected outcomes.
snowymountainhell
She may never be found if she was buried along the beach as he claimed but may she now “Rest In Peace” and her children find some solace in this life without their mother.
snowymountainhell
Poor woman was 32 years at the time of her murder. How old could the “eldest son” have been that Ono “felt his life would be ruined because of his inability to pay child support” ?
So he murdered her an kept her driver’s license ?
Numan
The research of DNA has been a godsend and a nightmare for both innocent and guilty people alike. Unless you are wrapped head to toe in plastic you cannot escape the transfer of DNA from person to person. I cannot count the number of times that I have found my partners hair in or around me. It literally found it its way into my mouth and she was not even home. I mean long hairs!
When I was a bachelor, I also think that she used to plant them in key places in my apartment where others might found it if they came over. She was basically marking her territory in case another woman was interested in me.
snowymountainhell
Today must be some kind of informal “DNA transfer day” (for lack of a better term) @Numan 6:43pm. - You really conveyed a mouthful of observations there and your first sentences would apply to the other sickening “Crime” story as well.
Alex
What excellent news the day following International Women's Day. //sarcasm
smithinjapan
I don't understand this place sometimes. You get people arrested after a dead body is found, buried under their new gazebo or something, with stab wounds, but all the people can be charged with is wrongful abandonment of a corpse. Then you get a case with no corpse, and a guy getting charged for murder and sentenced to 21 years when most murders get a quarter of that, if even.
justasking
That's why, if you are a criminal, you should always shower with bleach.
bokuda
Will be funny when the woman goes back home and finds her husband in jail.
therougou
No, they just go with that charge first because it's the easiest. Then they add the other charges one by one and lock the person up longer each time, breaking them bit by bit until they confess.
Kyo wa heiwa dayo ne
Yeah what if she's still alive ?