Girl held for setting apartment on fire after stabbing mother

Tuesday 29th September, 08:49 AM JST

IBARAKI —

Police arrested a 17-year-girl on charges of attempted murder and arson after she allegedly stabbed her mother and then set their apartment on fire in Ushiku, Ibaraki Prefecture, on Monday night.

Police said they received a call that an apartment was on fire. When they arrived, they saw the girl running out of a second floor apartment. When police questioned the girl, she confessed that she had stabbed her mother and set the apartment on fire.

Police said the fire was concentrated in the living room where they found the 37-year-old mother on the floor with stab wounds to her chest. Police extinguished the fire and the woman was taken to hospital where she remains in a stable condition. The girl has so far refused to say why she stabbed her mother.

News reports

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Latest 15 of 23 Total Comments Show All

tokyokawasaki at 10:22 AM JST - 29th September

With all of the stress and pressures of life in Japan, combined with almost no social services and the fact that you are seen as weak and an embarrassment to your family and friends if you seek help, I'm not surprised we see so many of these outbursts were people just SNAP...

So, so many things need to change before these sort of tragic attacks reduce in number.
dasyhard at 10:42 AM JST - 29th September

Why are these crime reports being published at all? It's really making this country look unstabled with these violent family issues. What a turn-around....from bowing and respecting your elders to thrashing knives to kill.
betterdays at 10:46 AM JST - 29th September

Why are these crime reports being published at all?

if they dont publish u complain ...if they publish u still complain!!!
buggerlugs at 10:51 AM JST - 29th September

Sadly bobbafett I agree with ur scenario.
gogogo at 11:15 AM JST - 29th September

Again (same as yesterday) can't be charged because she is a minor.
timorborder at 12:07 PM JST - 29th September

So mom and child survive. This is going to make for very interesting dinner time conversations after all this has blown over. Then again, just to be safe I reckon soup is going to become a very popular menu item in this family.
isthistheend at 01:28 PM JST - 29th September

17 years old. What a precious time in life. If only they had a life, which in this incident we can see the girl obviously felt she didn't have a life worth living, and out of total frustration and being pegged into the system from day no. 1, she did what she thought was the only thing she could do. Stop the absolute boredom in her life by destroying those closest to her, and somehow responsible for her miserableness. 17-year olds can be that way. We are lucky we made it through this period in happier conditions. But that being said, Japan will hopefully, someday take a good look in the mirror and decide that just maybe they need to think about educating the populace in ways different than whats going on nowadays; just be pretty, don't make noise, and wait till you time comes, (which in many cases it NEVER does!)
fishy at 01:48 PM JST - 29th September

mother's love is so big... wonder if this mother can still love the daughter just the same?
Monoflow at 05:08 PM JST - 29th September

Scary to see and hear where Japan's ruin of the society is leading to... Yes, it happens everywhere in the world, but often criminals in Japan put a little extra cream when it's about cruelty and psychopatic acting... Underaged seems to be no argument anymore, not to be punished. So let her stay in prison for some decades...
Shaolin7 at 09:09 PM JST - 29th September

I find it strange that there is far more sympathy being expressed than is usual, for JT. If it had been a 17 year old male, alot of people would be baying for blood, calling him out as a psycho, etc. There certainly wouldn't be any call for "help" or counselling. It seems rather hypocritical...
mnemosyne23 at 11:58 PM JST - 29th September

Stabbed the mother and lit the apartment on fire, hmm? I'll be interested to learn the motive. Was it selfishness on the part of the daughter (such as bobafett's "sugardaddy" example) or was it due to genuine mistreatment and abuse on the part of the mother? I'm not going to place blame on either party until I get those details.

I'd also like to ask for some clarification on something. It says the authorities were called when neighbors reported an apartment being on fire. But when the authorities arrived, they found the girl running out of the second floor apartment. Okay, what? I've heard of quick response times, but unless the cops and firemen were able to teleport to the scene, that means the girl stayed in the burning apartment until the authorities arrived, THEN decided to bolt. Does that make sense to anyone? Call me crazy, but if I'd just stabbed my mother and set my own home on fire I'd have booked it so fast you wouldn't see me for dust. There's more to this story that we aren't privy to, that's for sure.
nimbus at 09:45 AM JST - 30th September

mnemosyne23 - actually the article is not clear if the girl ran out of the burning apartment or just an apartment on the 2nd floor. JT loves to keep us guessing.
bamboohat at 10:20 PM JST - 1st October

All this stress, bleak future, parents always on kids to get better grades, shame thrown every which way, and toss into the mix these tiny apartments with thin walls where everybody is supposed to co-exist together in harmony.

Recipe for disaster.

The thing about pent up rage is that when you let it loose, it gets control over you and you do things you normally wouldn't have thought possible.
Ukhti at 03:32 AM JST - 2nd October

This has got to be a parent's worst nightmare, to have one of your own children try to kill you?!
sfjp330 at 03:44 AM JST - 2nd October

Stress and mental illness is a major problem in Japan. This girl must have sent many warning signs before this happened, which parents, friends and authorities ignored. They need to recognize the signs of problem before it escalates into something serious and try to get a proper treatment without worring about what your neighbors, relatives and company associates is going to say. Japan is a sick society.