Thursday, January 29, 2009

Monday, January 26, 2009

Mutilation murder suspect asks court to hang him without delay

TOKYO —

Prosecutors demanded Monday that a 34-year-old man be hanged for murdering a 23-year-old woman and mutilating and dumping her body. ‘‘It was a brutal and cruel crime, and there is no possibility that the defendant will be rehabilitated,’’ they told the Tokyo District Court, seeking the death penalty for Takanori Hoshijima. ‘‘The defendant must pay for his crime with death.’’

Hoshijima told the court, ‘‘Please hang me without further delay.’’ He had pleaded guilty and said that he ‘‘intends to apologize by accepting the death penalty.’’ Hoshijima forced Rurika Tojo into his apartment with the aim of sexually assaulting her on the night of April 18 and stabbed her to death with a kitchen knife, the indictment said. Between April 19 and May 1, he mutilated the body, flushed some body parts down the toilet and dumped others in the apartment’s garbage space, according to the indictment.

The court will deliver its verdict on Feb 18.