TOKYO (TR) – Tokyo Metropolitan Police on Saturday re-arrested former boyfriend of a 25-year-old woman whose corpse was found dumped in Sagamihara City, Kanagawa Prefecture last year for murder, reports TBS News (Feb. 20).
In June of 2013, Kazumaro Sato, 30, allegedly plied Yukari Abe with sleeping pills before strangling her inside her apartment in Shinjuku Ward.
Sato denies the charges.
Abe’s body was discovered in a cemetery in Sagamihara in June of last year. Police arrested Sato and his then girlfriend Chisaki Akiyama, 24, the following day and charged them with abandonment of Abe’s body.
A Tokyo court handed down a 10-month prison sentence, suspended for three years, to Sato in December. Akiyama remains on trial.
Police allege that Akiyama, who was also re-arrested for murder on Saturday, purchased the pills used in the crime. According to police, she claims Sato requested she purchase the pills.
In December of 2014, family members reported to police that Abe had gone missing. Police then launched an investigation.
The victim has a son whose whereabouts have been unknown, as far as information contained in government records, since 2007. Sato has denied having any knowledge about the boy.
