TOKYO (TR) – Tokyo Metropolitan Police are expected on Wednesday to re-arrest a man apprehended last week in Hiroshima Prefecture over the killing of a police officer in Tokyo more than four decades ago, reports the Sankei Shimbun (June 6).
According to police in Osaka and Tokyo, the results of a DNA analysis of the man in custody suggests he is Masaaki Osaka, a 67-year-old member of extremist group Chukaku-ha, who is wanted in connection with the killing of a 21-year-old police officer during a riot in Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward on November 14, 1971.
On May 18, Osaka Prefectural Police conducting an investigation into Chukaku-ha arrested a man, 52, in Hiroshima over the alleged provision of the submission of false documentation in the registration at a hotel. A second man who was with the suspect at the time was also taken into custody on suspicion of interfering with the duties of a public servant.
That second man is believed to be Osaka. Since his apprehension, the second man has remained silent. However, based on facial and physical traits he was believed to be Osaka.
In conducting the DNA analysis, police examined blood samples from Osaka, his mother and a male cousin. The results showed a relationship between the man in custody and the relative of Osaka. As well, a portrait photograph of the man in custody was shown to Osaka’s older sister, who confirmed him to be her brother.
On the day of riot, a protest against the occupation of Okinawa by the United States turned violent, with students swinging metal pipes and throwing Molotov cocktails at officers. Last year, the National Police Agency announced the offering of a reward of three million yen for information leading to the arrest of Osaka.
