Planned search of suspect's house over Kyoto girl's murder called off

Good to give advance warning.

This is an sterling example of how the NPA works. The image was captured on a convenience store camera at night. The people in the image are walking on the road in front of the convenience store. It is impossible to make out any features. They belive it was the girl because her CLOTHES matched the person in the "image". It is impossible to determine who or what the other person is. The old guy swiped some underwear and NOW he is their prime suspect. He will be forced to confess because the police don't even have a fingerprint from the murder scene.

"Good to give advance warning".

Actually, the more I see the word, "raid", I think it is just another inappropriate translation of the Japanese used in the original. The translators really need to get out and improve their English more for higher quality translations, rather then just relying on dictionaries.

It's not a raid, they've already taken the guy into custody - they're just going to search his house.

I love the fact that they are giving him a warning. "You'd better remove anything suspicious as we'll be coming to search your place in the near future".

Betting - you could be right with the bad translations. "The man was arrested in summer for stealing women’s underwear and around 2,000 yen from a collection box at a shrine" - does this mean the woman's underwear was left at the collection box too?!

so the cops found a petty crook living near the scene and want to pin a murder rap?

fatloser- You have no idea what other info they could have extracted from those images and kept confidential.

The man was arrested in summer for stealing women’s underwear and around 2,000 yen from a collection box at a shrine.

Why were women's underwear in the collection box at a shrine?

Larry makes a GREAT point!! In the Yomiuri article it says he resembles the man in the image. I guess it means he is the same height and has both his arms and legs and might have dark or light colored clothing. http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20081127TDY02312.htm

So how will they plant their evidence now?

Police have no evidence linking him to the death of Kosugi. So why would they want a search warrant? Not sure what the law is regarding warrants, but hope the guy has good lawyers.

This is an sterling example of how the NPA works. The image was captured on a convenience store camera at night. The people in the image are walking on the road in front of the convenience store. It is impossible to make out any features.

The image was sent to a lab in Chiba where they determined that the height and the position of eyes and nose matched that of the accused.

http://www.chunichi.co.jp/article/national/news/CK2008112702000062.html

The image was sent to a lab in Chiba where they determined that the height and the position of eyes and nose matched that of the accused.

http://www.chunichi.co.jp/article/national/news/CK2008112702000062.html

A bit far fetched but it sounds as if they should have gotten whatever warrant they needed before they went to the house to conduct the search. I am not familiar with the laws in Japan but that guy's lawyers were better at law than the police. They were able to stop the search. Looks like a blunder on J-police's part. Apparently even in Japan, they cannot randomly walk into anywhere to conduct a search.

The image was sent to a lab in Chiba where they determined that the height and the position of eyes and nose matched that of the accused.

Pffff, yeah right

A bit far fetched but it sounds as if they should have gotten whatever warrant they needed before they went to the house to conduct the search.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by "far fetched". I'm no expert of any kind but don't the prosecutors use video images and accompanying foresic experts to testify that the person in that "caption" is actually the accused.

And no. The police cannot randomly walk into anywhere to conduct a search. The warrant to search the house was accepted by Kyoto District Court (Maizuru Branch) but was appealed by the accused attorney on the night of the 26th.

"the man's lawyers filed an appeal at the last minute to block the search"

That's it! Give the man some time to destroy any evidence! If he's innocent, he would welcome the search to clear his name.

That's it! Give the man some time to destroy any evidence! If he's innocent, he would welcome the search to clear his name.

I believe he's still detained by the police.

If he's innocent, he would welcome the search to clear his name.

and give the j-cops a chance to stitch him up? no way. Romulus would flee the country.

After seeing the CCTV images I assume were used to identify the man, I'm not surprised that his lawyer sought to and successfully blocked a search of the man's residence. The images shown on the news last might brough a whole new meaning to the word "grainy." Granted, there may be better images out there, but by releasing those blurred, garbled, completely unclear images to the media, the NPA didn't exactly make a strong case for themselves.

It'd be great to see this crime solved, but this isn't starting off on the right foot.

stonefish- Are you a J-cop? You have no idea what evidence the cops have.

sarge: "That's it! Give the man some time to destroy any evidence! If he's innocent, he would welcome the search to clear his name."

Not necessarily. He may indeed welcome them into his house to clear his name, but if the police were intent on 'proving' it was him who committed the crimes, letting them in would seal his fate, even if innocent. J-cops are about as well known for forced confessions and false 'proof' as they are for bungling things up.

smith - You've got a point there. That's a scary thought, though, that the police would plant evidence...

Police could plant some more evidence for bigger conviction. They searched home before. Perhaps hey missed out something, and now evidence will be weak like 'Nappy Wipes’ for little babies. What a go0od lawyer. Is he from ‘Boston Legal’ group? What will accused do with all the women’s underwear? Is he a fisherman to smell them while catching fishes?

Larry - No I'm not a J-cop. But you might direct the same question to the author of this news report. The comment I made was based on the news report which stated that the police had no evidence linking the suspect to the crime. Yes, that's right - NO EVIDENCE. It seems that the actual article has been altered now and doesn't state this anymore. By golly perhaps they found some evidence....yeah, right!

"The new search was planned after suspicions emerged that the man was seen with Miho Kosugi, a 15-year-old first-year high school student who was found murdered in Maizuru on May 8, the police said."

WTF!!! How can there be "suspicions that a man was seen with Miho". What, the police are saying they suspect he was seen??? If they really are saying that then you'd have to question their integrity and their IQs and the citzenry as a whole that accepts (?) such tripe.

I say the guy is innocent. They are trying to pin him. All the best to him.

Even the morning shows were saying the cops had absolutely no evidence to link him to the murder,,,,apart from that surveilence pic.. which was such poor quality we could have been looking at a photo of victim with Elvis for that matter. On this shakey premise the police have zero right to search his home a second time for an unrelated crime. But then again the local Obasan said: "That blob in the picture looks EXACTLY like Catweazle down the road" Yes the man under 'investigation' is a much loathed neighborhood perve with a penchant for knicker theft, collecting mountains of s/crap in the backyard, and stealing spare change...BUT it is a giant leap to killing a local lass and concealing a body some 7 kilometers from the point of the surveilance snap. (All the while a mean feat for a 60 year old with only a bicycle for transport).

Hell, you couldn't even tell it was the victim in the video footage, much less who s/he was walking with. That video footage couldn't and shouldn't stand up in any reasonable court of law.

I'm not saying this is the case here but police DO plant evidence at times. There was a notorious narc in my home town with the nick name Santa Claus because he was known to leave behind little "presents" to be picked up by other narcs. The name was given by other cops, not the druggies. It's amazing this video could be accepted if it's the one I saw, as all there was were two grey blobs morphing into the night. Gimme a break...