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Osaka cop’s two-timing ends in murder

Shukan Jitsuwa Feb. 19
Shukan Jitsuwa Feb. 19
On January 25, Osaka Prefectural Police arrested Takashi Mizuuchi, a 26-year-old head patrol officer from the Abeno Police Station, for allegedly murdering his girlfriend in her apartment in Higashi Sumiyoshi Ward.

Mizuuchi is alleged to have strangled Hikaru Shirata, a 23-year-old employee at a hospital, with his belt on Saturday morning.

According to Shukan Jitsuwa (Feb. 19), the case is one of a two-timing officer who was in over his head.

“The two met at a matchmaking party in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture in May of 2013, when the officer was on a one-year assignment in support of recovery efforts following the Great East Japan Earthquake,” says a local news reporter. Mizuuchi married another woman in August of last year but maintained his relationship with Shirata. “She was a student at Tohoku Fukushi University.

When Mizuuchi returned to Osaka last year, she followed. But four months later, he got hitched with another woman. Yet he continued seeing Shirata.

“She started working at the hospital in March,” says a colleague of Shirata. “It seemed as if they were basically living together in Sendai.”

But once they both moved to Osaka things changed.

“He would only see her once every two months,” continues the colleague. “He said he was always busy with work.”

Shirata became lonely, and when she spoke of ending the relationship Mizuuchi would fervently refuse to accept such a notion. But his two-timing ways did not last long.

On January 21, Shirata went out with a friend for dinner. At one point during the evening, the acquaintance showed her an image posted on a social-media service of Mizuuchi that showed him with his wife.

Hikaru Shirata
Hikaru Shirata
When Shirata did not arrive for work three days later, the hospital contacted the management office of her apartment. An officer from the Higashi Sumiyoshi Police Station then found the clothed body of Shirata in her bathtub, which was filled half way with water.

After interviews with Shirata’s associates and the viewing of the building’s surveillance footage, police determined Mizuuchi had been involved.

““She talked about breaking up,” Mizuuchi told police. “She then became enraged and threatened to leak our relationship to my wife and supervisors. So I strangled her with a belt.”

The colleague says that Shirata had explained before she died that she wanted to get married.

“I will never forgive him,” says the colleague. (K.N.)

Source: “Bijin sosharuwaakaa wo ayameta futamata Bare Osaka fukei junsa-cho no guko,” Shukan Jitsuwa (Feb. 19, pages 206-207)