Dying and on his deathbed, Satoshi Kirishima confessed that he was one of Japan’s most wanted criminals. The police had been looking for him for more than 30 years.
“I want to find death under my real name,” he said as he confessed to police.
Kirishima was hospitalized for cancer treatment under a different name. He died on January 29, a few days after telling the truth.
To the surprise of many, a DNA test confirmed that the 70-year-old was telling the truth and was in fact a feared criminal in Japan: a member of a militant group that was behind several deadly attacks in the 1970s.
There is still no certainty as to how he remained free for so long, although the photo of his face appeared on various posters in Japan.
The old man was one of the most wanted in Japan and these are the serious crimes he may have been involved in
Authorities suspect that Satoshi helped plant and detonate a homemade bomb that destroyed part of a building in Tokyo’s Ginza district on April 18, 1975. There were no casualties in the attack.
At the time, the man was a member of the East Asian Anti-Japanese Armed Front, a radical left-wing organization that was reportedly involved in several attacks on businesses in Tokyo, including one that left eight people dead and more than 160 injured.
Kirishima is also said to have been involved in four other attacks by the organization. Two members were sentenced to death for their involvement in these events. The man would be the only one from the terrorist group who was never caught by the police.
Photo: EFE
a quiet man
When it became known who he really was, the neighbors were surprised about his criminal record; One of them described him to the Mainichi newspaper as a “quiet and serious” man.
Kirishima, who went by the false name Hiroshi Uchida, lived in the city of Fujisawa, on the western edge of Tokyo, for almost 20 years.
Police said he worked as a day laborer before landing at a construction company. Apparently he was always paid in cash and he had no phone number that could identify him.
It was only at this point that he revealed his true identity and the employees alerted the police.
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