HYOGO (TR) – A 45-year-old man serving a life-in-prison term for the murder of an elementary school girl in Okayama Prefecture two decades ago was arrested last week for attempted murder in a second case.
At around 6:20 p.m. on September 28, 2006, Kunihiko Katsuta is alleged to have repeatedly stabbed the second girl, aged 9, with a knife and seriously injured her in Tatsuno City.
The girl suffered serious injuries that took two months to heal, police said, according to the Mainichi Shimbun (Nov. 8).
During voluntary questioning by the Hyogo Prefectural Police, he said he was “looking around for girls.” As well, he admitted to stabbing the girl with a knife, but stated that he “did not intend to kill her.”
It was also revealed that he explained that he had hugged another girl just before the incident. Police believe that he was targeting girls he did not know. Both girls were targeted on their way home from cram school, and police are carefully verifying his statement.
On November 8, police sent Katsuta the Kobe District Public Prosecutors Office on suspicion of attempted murder. As he was brought to the office, he hid his face with a hood.
Murder of Yuzuki Unose
Katsuta is currently serving a life term for the murder of the first girl, aged 9, in Tsuyama City, Okayama Prefecture in 2004.
As well, Katsuta has made a statement to police that hints at his involvement in the murder of a third girl, Yuzuki Unose.
In October 2007, Unose, then aged 7, was stabbed in the chest and stomach by an unknown assailant in front of her home in Kakogawa City, Hyogo Prefecture. The girl, who was in the second grade at elementary school, later died.
Since then, police have been unable to solve the case, which is being treated as murder. However, it has been revealed that Katsuta has made statements implicating himself in that murder.
Police previously said that Katsuta has also been convicted and sentenced to prison for punching other girls in the stomach in 2000 and 2009.
“Not the culprit!”
After his apprehension in the Tsuyama case, Katsuta sent a series of letters written in pen with three different colors to Fuji News Network.
In a letter dated November 2021, before his sentencing, he claimed to have had nothing to do with the crime, calling it a false accusation. However, he also wrote that he has behaved abnormally toward young girls.
In that letter, he confessed to having stolen a girl’s blouse in Tsuyama, strangling a girl in Okayama City and stalking a girl in Kurashiki City.
On top of that, in October of last year, he sent another letter to the network that included a description of the murder of Unose. In the text, he says Hyogo police think that he was behind the crime. “Of course, [I’m] not the culprit!” he wrote.
Investigative sources said that voluntary police questioning began after the verdict was finalized in the Tsuyama case in September last year. During that session, Katsuta initially denied involvement in the other two incidents that occurred in Hyogo Prefecture. It was later revealed that as the questioning continued, however, that he changed his statement to admit his involvement.
