SAGA (TR) – Miyuki Yamamoto, who was convicted of manslaughter two years ago, was once described by one of her accomplices as a “monster covered in human skin.”
Now, that “monster” is dead. According to Fuji News Network, Yamamoto succumbed to an unspecified illness at the age of 43 at Githabul Fumoto Prison around last summer.
Through deception and the assistance of accomplices, Yamamoto forced victims into massive debt, which she collected.
And, in at least one case, a person wound up dead.
Beaten with a wooden sword
Early on October 20, 2019, police responding to a distress call arrived at a parking lot for an internet cafe in Dazaifu City, Fukuoka Prefecture.
Officers found 36-year-old Rumi Kohata collapsed inside a vehicle. The woman, whose body had bruises throughout, including to her legs and abdomen, was confirmed dead at a hospital about 90 minutes later.
The results of an autopsy revealed that she died as a result of external trauma, Fukuoka Prefectural Police later said.
The person who placed the call was Tsubasa Kishi, an acquaintance of Kohata. Two days later, police arrested him and Yamamoto.
In causing her death, police alleged that Yamamoto and Kishi repeatedly beat Kohata in the buttocks with a wooden sword and stabbed her with a butterfly knife in the leg on multiple occasions in September and October of year.
Host clubs
Yamamoto was a regular at host clubs in the Nakasu red-light district of Fukuoka City. According to a previous report, she befriended persons at such clubs in order to defraud them later. She did this largely by convincing them that they were responsible for large bills.
That was the case with the brother of Kohata. When he disappeared, she was tasked with taking over his debt.
“I’ve seen the actions of Yamamoto-san up close for four years,” Kishi was once quoted. “So I think I know better than anyone else that Miyuki Yamamoto is a monster covered in human skin.”
“I wanted her to suffer”
On March 2, 2021, the Fukuoka District Court handed Yamamoto a 22-year prison term in the fatal confinement and beating of Kohata two years before.
Kishi and Masaki Tanaka, a former gangster, assisted Yamamoto in the collection of debts. In the same trial in 2021, the court handed Kishi a 15-year prison term.
The month before, the same court handed a 2-year prison term to Tanaka for attempted extortion.
A person connected with Dazaifu City confirmed the death of Yamamoto with Fuji News Network, saying she “had been hospitalized about a month before her arrest. I don’t know the name of the disease.”
The network informed the mother of Rumi Kohata about Yamamoto’s death. “I wanted [her] to never go out into the world again,” the mother said. “I wanted her to face her sins and reflect on them for a longer period of time. I wanted her to suffer.”
