Monday, Oct 22, 2012
OKAYAMA, Japan - A man who was on the nationwide wanted list for more than a decade for a double murder has died after falling ill in Okayama, according to police.
Toshikazu Koike, 52, from Hokkaido, had been wanted by police for allegedly strangling a father and son in Tokushima in April 2001.
The police will investigate how Koike was able to remain at large for such a long time.
According to the Okayama and Tokushima prefectural police, a 67-year-old woman living at a condominium in Okayama called emergency authorities at about 9.10pm Friday, saying her partner was unconscious.
The man was confirmed dead at a hospital about one hour later. At first, the Okayama prefectural police did not realise the man was Koike when they conducted a postmortem examination. However, a funeral house official told the police Saturday that the man might have used a fictitious name because they could not confirm his identification.
After analysing the man's fingerprints and other features, the police concluded it was Koike.
When he was alive, Koike identified himself as Junichi Ogasawara and claimed to be 55, according to the police.
Although he was not married to the woman, she had reportedly been living with him since 2005. The eight-story condominium is in central Okayama.
After a fire broke out at a prefecture-run house in Tokushima on April 20, 2001, the body of 66-year-old Masaru Matsuda, who lived on the first floor, was found. On April 21, the body of Matsuda's son Hirofumi, 38, was found in what is now Sumoto, Hyogo Prefecture. Both had been strangled.
The Tokushima prefectural police placed Koike, who was acquainted with the Matsudas, on the national wanted list on suspicion of murder. The police's wanted poster with "Oi, Koike!" (Hey, Koike!) in large print caught many people's attention.
In 2010, the National Police Agency offered a reward of up to 3 million yen (S$46,000) in exchange for information that could lead to Koike's arrest.
According to a 23-year-old man who lives in the same condominium as Koike, rent for the studio-sized apartments is about 35,000 yen a month, and not many people live in the complex.
The man said he saw someone who might have been Koike about once a week. However, "he had short hair with inclined eyes and sunken cheeks. He didn't look like the man on the poster at all," he said.
The man said Koike did not try to hide his face when they encountered each other and simply exchanged greetings with him.
