FUKUOKA (TR) – The bodies of a 37-year-old woman and her three children have been found inside a vehicle in Tagawa City. Police are treating the case as a suicide and forced suicide, reports TBS News (Mar. 15).
On Sunday night, a relative of the family found the bodies of the woman and her children — two girls, aged 2 and 11, and a 7-year-old boy — inside the locked vehicle in a parking lot in the Ikari area.
Police arriving at the scene also found burned charcoal briquettes and a note hinting at suicide inside the vehicle.
The results of autopsies revealed that the four died due to poisoning from inhaling carbon monoxide fumes. They are believed to have died around 1:00 a.m. on Sunday.
The two-page note — presumably written by the woman — said that she had anxiety over raising her children and the future.
The woman’s husband lives in Tokyo. The relative went out looking for the four other family members after they failed to return home.
