Overview
- Prosecutors charged Ichiro Yamashita, 41, with murder, weapons violations and trespass over the July killings at a Hamamatsu girls’ bar.
- An indictment says he entered the bar around 2 a.m. on July 6 and fatally stabbed manager Tomoka Takeuchi, 27, and employee Rin Ito, 26, with two long knives, with both victims dying of blood loss.
- The Hamamatsu branch placed Yamashita in forensic detention from August 8 for about three months before filing charges; his plea has not been disclosed.
- In a separate 1999 Nagoya homicide, prosecutors began forensic detention of Kumiko Yasufuku, 69, after police said a DNA profile from the scene matched her sample, leading to her October 31 arrest.
- Hyogo police sent additional allegations to prosecutors in the Kobe case, saying the suspect stalked the victim in the two days before her August killing; he remains under psychiatric evaluation through December 8.