TOKYO (TR) – Tokyo Metropolitan Police have arrested a first-year high school girl after she stabbed a female classmate multiple times inside the library of a high school in Roppongi, Minato Ward on Friday, reports Nippon News Network (Oct. 30).
The attack unfolded at around 1:00 p.m., when school staff dialed police to report that a student had been stabbed. Responding officers found the victim, also a first-year student at the school, bleeding from multiple wounds to her side and shoulder. She was conscious and able to speak when transported to hospital, according to police.
The arrested girl has admitted to allegations of attempted murder, telling investigators she brought the kitchen knife from her own home. “I wanted to kill her and then die myself,” she told investigators, according to police sources. She also told officers she had been subjected to defamatory abuse online, which investigators believe may have been directed at her by the victim.
Police said they believe some form of ongoing dispute existed between the two girls and are probing the full circumstances of the attack.
The violence broke out on a day the school had been holding a closed cultural festival, open only to students and staff, with pupils streaming out of the gates in the early afternoon unaware of the scene unfolding inside. A reporter at the scene noted uniformed officers stationed in front of the school entrance as the atmosphere turned grim.
Tokyo police said the investigation is continuing.
