Nakano: In connection with a knife and gun attack that left four people dead, including two police officers, in Nakano, Nagano Prefecture, central Japan, police detained a 31-year-old man on Friday.
Twelve hours after the incident started, Masanori Aoki, the first son of Masamichi Aoki, 57, speaker of the Nakano city assembly, was apprehended at 4:30 a.m. (7:30 p.m. Thursday GMT).
Masanori Aoki, who was involved in the incident, launched a knife attack starting at 4:25 pm on Thursday, shot a hunting rifle and then took refuge in his father's flat in the city.
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Yukie Murakami, 66, who lived close to the house, was stabbed to death, according to the Nagano Prefectural Police. He also shot and killed Takuo Ikeuchi, 61, and police officers Yoshiki Tamai, 46, who had responded to an emergency call. After being taken to the hospital, the three were determined to be dead.
Along with the other three, an elderly woman who was discovered lying on the ground close to the house later died, making a total of four people killed in the incident. At first glance, the woman appeared to be a man.
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Aoki, dressed in camouflage and sunglasses, hid in a house about 600 metres from the scene of the stabbing. Intermittent gunfire could be heard in the area.
He was spotted outside the residence starting around 2 a.m. on Friday. He reportedly later turned himself in to the police after reentering the home.
When Aoki started to retreat, there were two women present, including her mother. Around 8:35 p.m., the mother fled the home. Thursday, and the second woman—a suspect's relative—left around 12:10 in the morning.
It has been determined that the two women and the suspect's father are safe. The location is 1.5 kilometres west of Shinshunakano Station on the Nagano Electric Railway.
Investigative sources claim that prefectural police deployed on the scene were joined by the special investigation team of Tokyo's Metropolitan Police Department's first investigation division. Locals were evacuated to a nearby school while access to a 300-meter radius around the incident site was restricted.
