Akita case worsens with each telling
(From The Japan Times July 24 issue)

秋田県児童連続殺人事件の謎

    On July 18, Hatakeyama was served a third arrest warrant — this time on suspicion of murdering her own 9-year-old daughter, Ayaka — after telling police earlier in the month that she had pushed her from a bridge April 9.

    Two factors deserve attention: One is the bizarre nature of the crimes. Why did Hatakeyama, a divorcee living on welfare, kill her only child and then a neighbor's son within a span of 40 days? The second factor is the apparently shoddy police work in the initial investigation of Ayaka's death. Police at first concluded that Ayaka had drowned accidentally.

    Hatakeyama first told police that Ayaka had disappeared the afternoon of April 9 after "going to a friend's house." The next afternoon her body was found floating in the Fujikoto River, a tributary of the Yoneshiro River. The police announced that Ayaka seemed to have slipped down a riverbank while playing and then drowned.

    More than a month later, on the afternoon of May 17, the boy, Goken, went missing. His body was found the next afternoon in the grass near the Yoneshiro River in Noshiro, the same prefecture.

    Days after being arrested on suspicion of dumping the boy's body there, Hatakeyama told police that she happened to spot him near her home, called him inside the house and strangled him with a kimono cord.

    Hatakeyama then reversed her account of events involving her daughter, saying that she and Ayaka went by car to Osawa Bridge on the Fujikoto River, about 2 km from home, on the evening of April 9 and that the girl accidentally fell into the river. Her body was found about 4 km downstream from the bridge.

    Later the mother changed her story again, saying she pushed her daughter from the bridge. She said she had taken Ayaka to the bridge because her daughter wanted to see the kind of fish that appeared in her favorite comic books. When they could not spot any fish, the girl became "annoying" and the mother, irritated with her behavior, pushed her from the bridge, according to the police.

    For their part, police say there were reasons early on to believe that the girl had accidentally died alone, including signs that somebody had slipped down the riverbank. A police dog traced the girl's scent to the scene.

    But considering the fact that there are two low-level dams between where police said Ayaka had fallen into the river and the spot where the girl's body was found 6 km downstream, some local residents said it was strange that the girl's body was found as early as the next day. And the girl's skull was found to have been fractured.

    If police had paid more attention to local residents' suspicions and the injury to Ayaka's body, their initial conclusion might have been different, possibly leading to an earlier arrest of Hatakeyama and prevention of Goken's murder.

    Hatakeyama's behavior after her daughter was found dead was strange in itself. She called police time and again trying to get them to reopen the case after police concluded that the girl's death was accidental. The mother distributed fliers urging locals to come forward with any information they might have about her daughter's whereabouts on the last day she was seen alive. She asked TV stations to help find the truth behind the death. If she had kept quiet, it seems unlikely that police and public interest in the girl's death would have been revived.

    Some neighbors say Hatakeyama neglected taking good care of her daughter and there were signs she was not given enough food at home. It is said that Ayaka went to school in wrinkled clothes, and that her mother would not meet a teacher who visited the house. Police need to unravel the mother and daughter relationship.

    As for the murder of Goken, Hatakeyama said she reasoned that if another child was killed, people would think that her daughter was killed by someone. Before that confession, she said that she was jealous of Goken, who was alive and fine while her daughter, Ayaka, was dead.

    Hatakeyama's accounts of events and behavior are incongruous, as is her not hiding the kimono cord she used to strangle the boy. The truth will not come out without a determination of the motive behind the crimes. By all means, her childhood and adolescent experiences, as well as relations with relatives, friends and neighbors, must be examined.

The Japan Times Weekly: July 29, 2006
(C) All rights reserved

    7月18日には、畠山容疑者は自分の娘の彩香ちゃんを殺した疑いで再逮捕された。

    この事件に対して二つの疑問がある。まず、離婚して生活保護を受けていた容疑者が、なぜ40日の間に自分の一人娘と近所の男の子を殺害したのか。次に、彩香ちゃんの死を事故と断定した警察の初動捜査に不手際はなかったのか。

    容疑者は当初、彩香ちゃんが4月9日の午後「友達の家に行く」と言って家を出たきり、行方不明になったと警察に届け出た。翌日、彩香ちゃんは藤琴川で遺体で発見された。5月17日、今度は豪憲君が行方不明になり、翌日、米代川川岸で遺体で発見された。

    豪憲君の死体遺棄容疑で逮捕された畠山容疑者は、自宅で豪憲君を絞殺したことを自供した。容疑者はさらに供述をひるがえし、4月9日に自分が彩香ちゃんを橋から川に突き落したことを認めた。

    警察は当初、彩香ちゃんは誤って川に落ちたたと断定したが、事故現場とされる場所と6キロ下流の遺体発見現場の間には堰が2ヵ所あり、遺体の翌日発見は早すぎるという声が住民から出ていた。しかも、彩香ちゃんは頭部を骨折していた。

    警察が慎重に捜査を行っていれば、容疑者を早期に逮捕し、連続殺害を防げた可能性もある。

    容疑者は、彩香ちゃんについて情報を求めるビラを地元住民に配ったりテレビ局に真相究明を求めたりと、自分に不利になるような行動を取っている。豪憲君殺害も、娘を亡くした切なさからではなく、「もうひとり子供が殺害されたら、彩香も殺されたということになるのではないか」と動機を変化させている。

    事件の真相は、犯行動機の解明なくして究明できない。容疑者の児童期・思春期の環境、家族・友人関係などを精査する必要がある。