A serial stabbing at a care center for the disabled in Sagamihara has left 19 dead (9 women and 10 men aged between 18 and 70) and 26 grievously wounded, a horrific event that the murderer himself has described as his attempt to “rid this world of the disabled.”
The 26-year-old man had broken into the Tsukui Yamayuri En centre early in the morning (which was being monitored by only 8 staff members at the time) by smashing the window before murdering all he could with a knife, doubtless aided by the condition of his victims or them being asleep, causing some to label the tragedy as the worst mass murder in Japan in some 70 years.
The man, a former employee at the care center, was finally arrested not at the scene but after turning himself into the police 30 minutes after his rampage, proclaiming “I did it”; additionally exposing that he had gone through with the malicious attack in order to “rid the world of the disabled.”
A letter sent by the arrested man to the lower house of Japan’s parliament (prior to his mass murder) revealed his demands to “euthanize” the disabled:
“My goal is a world in which, in cases where it is difficult for the severely disabled to live at home and be socially active, they can be euthanized with the consent of their guardians.”
The letter goes on to state that he would carry out the homicide during the night whilst his victims were asleep, then turn himself in to the police where he would be “jailed for two years” and then be given “a disguise for regular society through plastic surgery” – a rather ludicrous presumption.
The letter in its entirety:
Dear Lower House Speaker Tadamori Oshima,
Thank you very much for reading this letter. I can wipe out a total of 470 disabled individuals.
I am fully aware that my remark is eccentric. However, thinking about the tired faces of guardians, the dull eyes of caregivers working at the facility, I am not able to contain myself, and so I decided to take action today for the sake of Japan and the world.
My reasoning is that I may be able to revitalize the world economy and I thought it may be possible to prevent World War III.
I envision a world where a person with multiple disabilities can be euthanized, with an agreement from the guardians, when it is difficult for the person to carry out household and social activities.
I believe there is still no answer about the way of life for individuals with multiple disabilities. The disabled can only create misery. I think now is the time to carry out a revolution and to make the inevitable but tough decision for the sake of all mankind. Let Japan take the first big step.
Would Mr. Tadamori Oshima, who bears the world, use his power to make the world proceed in a better direction? I sincerely hope you would deliver this message to Mr. Shinzo Abe. This is the answer I reached after serious thinking about what I can do for humankind.
Dear Lower House Speaker Tadamori Oshima, would you lend your power for the sake of dear Japan and all humankind?
Please give this full consideration. Satoshi Uematsu
The Plot: It will be carried out during the night shift, when staffing is low. The target will be two facilities where many multiply disabled people reside.
Staff on guard will be strapped with cable so they can’t move and can’t make contact with anyone outside. The act will be carried out speedily, and definitely without harming the staff. After wiping out the 260 people in two facilities, I will turn myself in.
In carrying out the act, I have several requests. After my arrest, my incarceration should be up to two years, and please let me lead a free life afterward. Innocence on grounds of insanity. A new name (Takashi Iguro), government registration and documents such as a driver’s license needed for everyday life.
A disguise for regular society through plastic surgery. Financial aid of 500 million yen ($5 million). I would like these conditions to be promised.
If you can make your decision, I will carry it out at any time. Please consider this fully for the sake of Japan and world peace.
I hope with all my heart that this can be discussed with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, although I am sorry to trouble him in an unimaginably busy schedule.
Satoshi Uematsu
The authorities – for whatever reasons – did act in response to this letter, which led to the man being investigated, losing his job and being involuntarily committed to psychiatric evaluation. He was then released without further supervision or charges.
The mother of a daughter who knew the murderer was shocked by his actions:
“I was surprised to hear that the culprit was a person from this neighborhood. My daughter knew the culprit, I mean, they were acquainted. They would greet each other when they would meet and she tells me that he was a very kind person. We are all very shocked.”
If judged mentally culpable, as seems likely given the extent of the planning which led to the attack, he will likely face the death penalty.
The irony here is that the guy is pretty much right and there are countries where euthanasia is allowed. It’s a tough subject to discuss, but ultimately I think Japan should drop it’s policy on censoring porn before tackling this issue.
The problem being, euthanasia is by definition made with the explicit consent of the person who will die. That’s the reason it doesn’t apply to unconcious patients, like long standing coma.
So this is literally murdering people in their sleep. Nothing else.
No it’s not. Here, learn something.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euthanasia
You learn something. Third paragraph from your own link.
Involuntary euthanasia (without asking consent or against the patient’s will) is also illegal in all countries and is usually considered murder.
Wikipedia? Really? Have you even tried checking the differences in the articles in different languages? Just this one is peachy, you’ll find out at least 4 different definitions depending on the language you choose. So no, while it might be helpful, it is not reliable as a source for definitions.
just kill all black ppl, problem solvet
right after merica stops censoring pretty much everything in Japanese games, ok 😀
Um. If they’re censored in Japan, they get exported with those same censors, except in very rare circumstances. I can safely say North America as a whole doesn’t tend to censor outsourced games.
Try taking off your parental block or look up a friggin steam patch… eesh. Kids.
Stop talking nonsense. While All that Japan censors is exposed vagina, America bans EVERYTHING from “the finger” gesture to dress cleavage. And the most dangerous thing about american censorship is – that it’s unsystematic, doesn’t have solid set of rules and bound to voice of stupid minority.
Are you people stupid? “America” doesn’t censor this stuff. The game publishers censor it themselves in an attempt to make their games more marketable to a wider audience.
North America has the ESRB rating system, but that’s an organization created by game publishers, not some government body. It’s simply there to provide content descriptions to people purchasing games, and to stores who might wish to use discretion in determining what to put on their shelves, and doesn’t “ban” anything. Unless a game is outright porn, it should have little trouble attaining an “M” or lower rating and appearing on store shelves at most retailers, and anyone purchasing an “AO” game would probably prefer something like digital distribution anyway. Some publishers might censor their games to attain a lower ESRB rating, but that’s for nothing more than to increase their sales to younger audiences, whose parents might, for example, not purchase an “M” rated game for.
And of course, some publishers and developers may self-censor their games to avoid upsetting SJW types, but those exist worldwide.
That’s not America’s fault, that’s just Nintendo’s or whatever game company’s localisation team’s lack of back bone.
Except that ‘murica does censor a lot of stuff pointlessly and calls it “localization”…They change stuff that shouldn’t even be changed because it’s easier to do asspulls than a proper translation…and then we have all the censoring applied to various games like removed content from Mugen Souls,Criminal Girls,Fire Emblem:Fates,etc…There’s plenty more and a lot of good games get this bullshit for no good reason at all other than “cultural difference that will cause the player to not understand what’s going on”…Except that we do understand and that’s *WHY* we play these in the first place…Fucking retarded ‘murica pissing on everyone’s fun…at least they now still leave the option to have the voices in Japanese so you don’t actually have to read their botched translations which they call localizations.
At first I was going to agree, then I was like wait what.
The sad part is you’ve got a point.. before they even attempt to tackle s♥♥t like humane euthanasia on the grounds of rescuing someone from an inevitable life of suffering, they’ve really got to come to grips on allowing people to make their own decisions on their own lives and bodies. And, irritating as it is to agree in this sense, starting with the whole ‘all genitals must be censored at all times’ thing is a hilariously easy start that would also be a COLOSSAL step in the right direction. -_-
I mean.. freedom of speech for your own body, seriously? Where the hell is it in Japan?
The funniest part is, it was the US that imposed all the puritanical bullshit on Japan after WW2.
Christ, now iv’e heard everything.
Half of these comments make me wish humanity as a whole got “euthanized” (and about half of those comments are posted by Chan-04, so maybe we just need to “euthanize” him?) and less than half are so bystander-syndrome-ish that they make me lose hope in humanity, leaving a very small part of the comments to reaffirm my faith in humanity and remind me of why I at least try to be an idealist striving for a better, more humane world…
It happen 4km from where I live. Saw it on the news at work.
After reading this, I don’t remember any mention of the letter during the reports.
None of the pro-murder idiots will be spared if Euthanasia becomes state policy especially if it was so due to lack of resources. No mangaka who draws ero 2D or people who consume them would escape.