Man says he kept parents' bodies in house for 10 years so he could collect their pensions

What a terribly queer affair, was he so impoverished to have to resort to this ghastly act?

So mom was there with dead dad for at least a year too. Allegedly.

How much pension were they even getting?

YUP, this is a Phenomena in Japan, I don't know if it's happening in other parts of the world but it seems to be at a higher rate here, Parasites living off their parents are willing to do ANYTHING to keep that $$ coming.

The love of $$$ has a special grip on people to the point where it overtakes all other relations.

It took them ten years to check up on the couple? There is something seriously wrong with a system that allows him to collect both their pensions for a decade.

"many people are facing financial difficulties due to the aging population and low birth rate..."

It's due very low wages that have barely budged in about 30 years, not to mention an extremely flimsy social safety net.

This is common in Japan

This is not uncommon in Japan

It's entirely uncommon in Japan. That's why it makes the news, because it's NOT what people normally do.

In fact, everyone in Japan doesn't do this, with the exception of a few dozen out of the millions and millions of families in Japan. The idea that this is something common to the people of Japan is, frankly, ridiculous.

This is common in Japan

See previous post.

According to police, Naoki Sera said his father Oichi died of natural causes in 2013 and his mother Masako also died of natural causes the following year, Kyodo News reported. 

Police said Sera kept his parents’ bodies on top of each other, wrapped in paper and blankets, and stored them in their bedroom.

I am not surprised there is another story about people not reporting the death of their elderly parents in order to keep receiving pensions . However, I am surprised this time there are two dead persons and they are reported to die a year apart. Did the mother agree with the son to keep the dead body of the father in their house? I do not think using paper and blankets is the right way to preserve a dead body. The whole story is just sad.

What a terribly queer affair, was he so impoverished to have to resort to this ghastly act?

after three months of unemployment you don’t get a cent from the government. Pension is around ¥65000 a month. So I think yes, was probably improvised. And he was in rental accommodation.

I think the Japanese regime is onto this kind of fraud. MY NUMBER.

The fraud starts earlier and somewhere else, when people like him don’t have enough income for daily living in case they would abide to the rules. If own existence is endangered almost everyone would consider the possibility of breaking some rules or committing illegal acts, the small rest gives in and probably commits suicide and those numbers are also big for similar reasons as you surely know too. Besides of a crime or suicide there’s another option, begging for some public money at a welfare center, but that’s the option with the most unknown outcome or potentially lowest success rate, therefore logically so many chose instead from the other two.

The root of this abnormal behavior lies in the unemployment and pension poverty found in the dregs of Japan's capitalist barrel. This problem will only get worse because the LDP government only cares about the numbers in the macro-economy.

This news was beyond my belief happened in Japan. I thought Japan was not worse than I knew. It seems that basic human problems are almost the same in every country anyway.

fusliatToday  09:47 am JST

This news was beyond my belief happened in Japan. I thought Japan was not worse than I knew. It seems that basic human problems are almost the same in every country anyway.

It always was a fallacy that japan was above others. In fact japan is just the same as any other nation on the planet.

LoveJapanToday  07:15 am JST

According to a report by Japan’s National Police Agency, there were 14,461 cases of specialized fraud in 2021, which is a 6.7% increase from 20201. Specialized fraud includes pension fraud, where people pretend to be relatives or officials of deceased pensioners and collect their money. This type of fraud is often targeted at elderly people who are vulnerable or isolated.

*And then ***StrangerlandToday**  07:59 am JST

This is not uncommon in Japan

It's entirely uncommon in Japan. That's why it makes the news, because it's NOT what people normally do.

In fact, everyone in Japan doesn't do this, with the exception of a few dozen out of the millions and millions of families in Japan. The idea that this is something common to the people of Japan is, frankly, ridiculous.

--Stragerland, nearly 15,000 cases is not a few dozen.

I remember about 10 years ago local authorities in Japan checking on their "over 100's" and finding that many of them were "missing" or unaccountable. Pensions still being paid.

This is a REALLY common story here.

The assumption that scamming and rorting is endemic predisposes the authorities to engage in a cynical trade off. In return for providing welfare that’s totally incommensurate with people’s needs or the nation’s economic capacity, there’s a certain inbuilt tolerance of malfeasance and propensity to turn a blind eye to egregious abuses such as this. Consider the alternative; crack down and prosecute with the full force of the law, then watch as the proverbial chickens come home to roost and they’re forced to contend with the resultant desperation only just being kept at bay.

This is a REALLY common story here.

This is an incredibly rare crime in Japan. Out of all the tens of millions of pensions being paid, there may be only a handful of such cases per year.

Ultimately, as others have said, this is most likely not very common in Japan... but! How old now is the average "hikkikomori" and how old on average are their parents? It is estimated that there may be as many as 10 million hikki's in Japan... and their average age is now getting to the 50's, putting their parents at 70 to 80. Going forward this trend may increase.

The smell though - how did he manage to keep it contained and, assuming the parents lived there their entire lives, how did the neighbors fall for the lie of them having moved to live with another one of their kids? Also, are there no welfare or well-being checks conducted on those receiving pension? Sounds like the system is broken.

Semantics Strangerland. You know what I mean. It is more common than any other nation I know of.

I think you probably have never fact checked that even the tiniest little bit. I would bet you just said that without any clue whatsoever how much it differs between Japan and other countries.

And whichever way you cut it, it is NOT common.

Pension is around ¥65000 a month.

That is correct. There are a lot of pensioners struggling to live. Even the other pension scheme pays measly. 150 000 yen a month and some struggle on it. Shocking what he did to make ends meet.

They waited 10 years?

the ward office contacted police to report that the elderly couple had not been heard from in a long time