GIFU (TR) – Gifu Prefectural Police are investigating what is believed to have been a murder-suicide following the discovery of the bodies of an elderly woman and her son inside their residence in Toki City over the weekend, reports the Mainichi Shimbun (Mar. 3).
At around 11:30 a.m. on March 2, emergency personnel working off a tip entered the residence, located in the Dachicho area, and found the 81-year-old woman dead atop a futon and her son, 51, hanged by a rope attached to a dresser.
The interior of the residence showed no signs of having been ransacked, and the bodies showed no signs of external wounds, the Tajimi Police Station said.
Based on the circumstances at the time of the discovery, police believe the son took his life after killing his mother by an unspecified means.
Emergency personnel entered the residence after being alerted to an accumulation of newspapers outside by a male neighbor. The oldest newspaper was dated February 23.
Another male neighbor told the Gifu Shimbun that the man served as a nurse for his mother since there were no relatives living nearby.