Man arrested for beating 5-year-old daughter in Wakayama

The Child Welfare Office -

What exactly do they do?

Because following up on leads is clearly not on their agenda. - Pathetic, and totally shameful...

You do know that in half the states in the US it is legal to paddle children in school. As in, beat someone else's child with a piece of wood. Just FYI.

Kobatake was quoted by police as saying that he was just trying to discipline the girl.

In Japan I have found that physical violence/bullying and discipline/teaching often go hand in hand.

Serves the bastard right!!

oups, bad tipping...

@omomodo (again) That poor 5 year old girl was abused during 2 long years before somebody reported it to the police. The truth is nothing will be done if people run away and shut their mouth when they see or hear abuse on children and domectic violence. Domestic violence is a tough situation for the police. They need testimony to establish the abuse.

if you beat on, kill, injure or traumatize a kid you are out of the human club. it just breaks my heart to hear about these cases. these ppl are not human like most people- they are monsters that will haunt these kids until the day THEY grow up and beat their own kids.

If you don't understand that hitting a child in the face is wrong, and you can even bring yourself to do it - and then to your own child, how have you been brought up, and how sick are you? And then, is it possible for that person to be educated.

Many here probably don't believe in any form of smacking anywhere on the body, but for those who do, how could you punch a child in the face?

Though in Asia, parents do slap faces in the way westerners slap legs or behinds. It's strange enough that teachers and parents slap their teenagers in the face - or at least they used to.

Authorities say that the local child welfare office had been receiving calls about Kobatake from relatives since 2008.

And what in the hell have the child welfare office people doing for two years? Oh, wait, let me guess, the situation is regrettable, and they will honestly endeavor to remedy the situation, as they honestly want to save the children.

This guy should be thrown into jail and have 10 lashes by caning like in Singapore. And after his sentence, he should never be allowed to see his daughter again. He should also be forced to pay a child allowance to his daughter without any visitation at all. Guys like this should not have had any children at all to begin with.

Props to the teacher. May the little girl recover, and may this scum have the **** kicked out of him.

he was just trying to discipline the girl.

As I keep trying to tell people. The Japanese have no idea what constitutes child abuse. To them it is normal parenting to beat your kid around the head. And yes, I am generalizing because it is general behavior!

Wakayama: more concerned about covering up dolphin culls than child abuse judging by the two year delay in dealing with this dickhead dad.

The Child Welfare Office has been receiving reports of this guy since 2008, and they had not taken action! That is a shame!

I've seen my share of abuses in Jp. Not just against children either. One of my traumatic moments was when I was hanging out with a friend of my wife's, a Canadian single mother of 3. Her boyfriend wanted to go out, jumped in his jeep, realized the gas tank was empty, freaked out and ran into the house, grabbed my friend, shook her while screaming at her, then pushed her to the ground. As he was leaving the room, he picked up a big heavy leather boot in the doorway of the house and chucked it as hard as he could and the heel hit this poor woman squarely in the face. I was effing shocked to say the least. He then yelled at me and told me to the out of 'his' house that the woman is paying rent for. So I left, shaken. What could I do? I'm only a gaijin in that country, so my words, opinions and advice would count for nothing anyways. Why do women and children have to put up with such crap in Jp? It's the worst of any country I've been to. If the above mentioned incident had happened in Canada or the States, the cops would be paying buddy a visit. But it's Jp and it's the man's right to beat, abuse and leave the wife and kids behind with little or no consequences. Japan makes me ashamed to be a man knowing what men get away with and the women and children pay the price of their f**&-ups.

Smith, I thought exactly the same thing. Japan is moving from "Anything goes" to "Zero tolerance". Clearly, there is some point where people cant read the news anymore without wanting to barf.

These bullying men make me sick - and not just the ones that beat up on little girls, but the ones who try to intimidate women, mothers with children, in fact anyone smaller than they are. I would LOVE to see this guys ass whipped - hell, I`d PAY for the privilege! What a great way to put money back into the Japanese governments coffers!

Why does it take soooooooooo long?

Unless this girl is a hemophiliac then it takes a LOT of force to put a bruise on someone's face - I've done martial arts for a while and I've been hit in the face often enough to know.

This guy deserves to be charged with assault (with the injuries taking X weeks to heal) and put away. No special category of charges required, just stop treating children like 2nd-class citizens.

Agree with tokyotales... the real story is why no "discipline" from the authorities since 2008? Poor girl.

Let's hope that the agency that protects children from being abused is a safer place than the home. If it's not then back to square one.

At least this time someone took note and there is some reaction.

Yep, and the fist is the best way you could think of?

Sounds like a future for a father who was stabbed by the daughter while he slept.

All part of the 'culture' over here; punishment, aggressive physical contact on a daily basis (head slapping being deemed not only acceptable but funny), sempai - kohai bullsheyet.

This is not going away any time soon. To get rid of this, the entire culture has to change.

Since 2008?? So what have been done between then and now?

Better late then never, I guess, but I hope the child is protected against this guy and he's prosecuted to the fullest (well actually, I hope more)extent of the law.

with an aging population and shrinking pension, Japan should want to protect the young people in this crap country.

There can't possibly be any excuse for this. Disgusting.

Real tough guy, punching a little girl. I say let him be thrown into the ring at a UFC match for a taste of his own medicine.

Judges, don't miss the chance to do justice to this child. Please stop treating criminals as victims.

I'm really starting to get frustrated with this place. The kid should have been taken away a long time ago

I agree with Dolphingirl. What. just call and do nothing? The reletives sahould be punished as well!

The last statement is the real kicker. This poor girl has likely been abused by this man for the last two years. Child welfare office: You have got to do much much more!! Relatives: You could have made more of an effort to save this little girl, too!

You know my three year old son can be trying to say the least! How do you do things like this to your own child? They are just children. They never asked to to be born!Take responsibility. regardless of circumstances of their conception, where is the heart here, where is the parenting instinct? Makes me want to cry for these kids! This by no means a problem for just Japan but one for the whole world!

Bad timing for this guy -- had it been even a few weeks ago he wouldn't have even been arrested; but now Japan is finally getting the bad rap it deserves after no one did a thing to protect the two kids murdered by the prostitute mom in Osaka. I think people are finally realizing they need to do something to protect kids.

In any case, I hope this guy rots in prison for a while, but knowing the system here he won't do any time at all.