Satoshi Uematsu handed himself to police on Tuesday, hours after going on a rampage that killed 19 and wounded another dozen residents of a home for the disabled in a small town near Tokyo, Japan’s worst mass killing in decades.
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Because of the country’s extreme gun laws, attackers resort to stabbing, although this is the largest mass killing in Japan since World War II.
Kanagawa regional authorities said Uematsu had left dead or injured almost a third of the almost 150 patients at the centre in a matter of 40 minutes.
By The Associated Press The 26-year-old man accused of carrying out a mass stabbing Tuesday at a Japanese facility for the mentally disabled that left 19 people dead had written a letter in.
Uematsu had previously also delivered a letter to the speaker of the lower house of parliament in which he threatened to kill hundreds of disabled people and even asked for euthanasia of disabled people as “handicapped people only create unhappiness”. He had earlier delivered a letter to parliament outlining the bloody plan and saying all disabled people should be put to death.
A man turned himself in at a police station about two hours later, police in Sagamihara said. But after just 12 days, doctors deemed him safe to release in March, Japanese authorities said.
Staff at the home first contacted police at 2:30 AM local time on Tuesday morning (17:30 PM GMT Monday), reporting a man near the grounds at Tsukui Yamayuri Garden, dressed in black and wielding a knife.
The Asahi Shimbun newspaper wondered why Uematsu’s involuntary commitment to the hospital ended so quickly, given he had made clear his intentions. If the time period drags on longer than necessary, it becomes a serious violation of human rights…
“It would be easier to understand if there had been a warning but there were no signs”, said Akihiro Hasegawa, 73. “Was the treatment and outwatch of the man sufficient?” Uematsu delivered a letter detailing his plan to kill the disabled before he was sacked from the facility earlier this year, although no action was taken against what the letter threatened.
Local media said Uematsu has told police that he wants to apologise to bereaved families about the sudden loss of their loved ones, though he still justified what he did.
Uematsu had worked at the facility until February. Another broadcaster, NTV, said he broke into the facility by smashing a window with a hammer, and that he was upset because he had been fired, but that could not be independently confirmed.
Police said there were several casualties but did not provide any numbers.
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Shortly after the attack in Sagamihara he reportedly walked into a police station and told officers: “I did it”.
