OSAKA (TR)- Osaka Prefectural Police have arrested a 35-year-old man over the alleged dumping the body of his wife in Okayama Prefecture last year, reports the Asahi Shimbun (Feb. 10).
Investigators have yet to find the corpse of the wife of Yoshifumi Kuroki. However, police accused the suspect, who lives in Osaka City’s Chuo Ward, of abandoning a corpse on Monday.
“Based on security camera footage and testimony from related parties, we have determined that there is a strong suspicion that she died and was abandoned,” police said on Monday.
“I can’t say anything right now,” the suspect was quoted by police. He was sent to prosecutors on Wednesday morning.
Around June 5, Kuroki and a man in his 30s are is suspected of carrying the body of Kuroki’s wife, 52-year-old Izumi, from the couple’s residence in Chuo Ward to Okayama Prefecture by car and dumping it.
Security camera footage shot near the residence on that day shows two people, believed to be Kuroki and the accomplice, loading a large bag into a car.
Prefectural police believe Izumi’s body was in the bag.
“Dumped the body at a dam”
On May 26, Izumi returned home from her part-time job. That night, a neighbor reported hearing a man and woman arguing. Officers who arrived at the scene rang the intercom but received no response.
After that day, Izumi has not been heard from. Her relatives filed a missing person report with prefectural police on June 22.
Investigators also learned that the aforementioned accomplice told an acquaintance, “Kuroki [suspect] and I put the body in a bag and drove to Okayama. We then dumped the body at a dam.”
The accomplice then died. It is believed to have been a suicide.
Police are continuing to search for Izumi’s body in Okayama, near the residence of the suspect’s parents and other areas with the focus of the investigation shifting toward murder.
Separate incident
According to sources cited by Jiji Press (Feb. 12), Kuroki assaulted Izumi at a restaurant in Osaka City in February 2023. He was detained after being indicted and released on bail in December of the same year.
Kuroki married Izumi between his indictment and his release on bail. A source who knows the couple said of Izumi, “She seemed devoted. I think the two got along well.”
The source was unable to contact Izumi from around June last year. When they asked Kuroki about it, he said, “You don’t need to contact her.”
