A man who had threatened attacks on disabled people went on a knife rampage Tuesday at the care centre where he previously worked, leaving 19 people dead in Japan’s worst mass killing for decades.
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About 2:30 a.m., one of the eight staff members of the Tsukui Yamayuri En facility called the police to report the break in and alerted them of the knife attack by Uematsu.
People in disbelief are praying for the victims, raising the question of how the attacker managed to cause so much damage, wielding a knife for half an hour and there was no one to stop him before he turned himself in.
NHK said the suspect, 26, is a former employee at the facility, Tsukui Yamayuri-en.
Ambulance crew and firefighters work today outside a facility for the handicapped where a knife attack took place near Tokyo…
The Tsukui Lily Garden facility for the disabled in Kanagawa Prefecture housed a total of 149 people aged between 19 and 75. He broke a window to enter the facility and stabbed residents with multiple knives. Of the 26 injured victims, 13 are reportedly in critical condition.
Mass murders are a comparatively rare occurrence in Japan as it is considered as one of the safest countries in the world with very few deadly attacks.
“I feel pain as it’s said there was no problem, but that was the decision at that time”, said Eiji Yagi, another Sagamihara official in charge of the city’s mental health welfare section.
While the incentive for the attack is still unknown, it was reported that he had delivered a letter to the legislative arm of Japan outlining a social order where euthanasia of the physically challenged was accepted.
Police did not immediately release an official death toll.
Police said they were still investigating the suspect’s motive, but Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said there was no information linking Uematsu to Islamist extremists.
He said he would kill 260 severely disabled people at two areas in the facility during a night shift, and would not hurt employees.
“I am fully aware this is a statement that defies common sense”, he said in letters addressed to the speaker of parliament’s lower house, a copy of which was obtained by Kyodo news agency.
Naoko Kikuchi, one of the most wanted people in Japan for her involvement in the attacks, had been hiding in the city under the name Chizuko Sakurai. Nakatsuka said many other family members were waiting to hear about their relatives. Media reports from NHK and Kyodo News said 20 were wounded.
The attack shocked neighbors, many of whom said they had a good relationship with both the staff and the residents of the home in the hilly, semi-rural community in Sagamihara.
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The letter also said he felt “sorry” for people with disabilities, many of whom were bound to wheelchairs for life.
