Crime May. 25, 2009 - 10:00AM JST ( 13 )

YAMAGUCHI —

A 35-year-old unemployed man has been arrested for illegally disposing of a corpse, accused of putting the body of a 61-year-old woman he lived with under the floor of her home in Shimonoseki City.

Police said Sunday they received a call from a neighbor in April saying he hadn’t seen the woman’s 60-year-old sister or 83-year-old mother, whom she lived with, for about a year. Police went to the home and questioned the woman, Tsuyako Kobata, and also questioned Sadafumi Uchikado, who started living with them two years ago. Kobata told police her sister and mother had gone back to their hometown in Fukui prefecture, but police made another visit to the home on Friday after the neighbor called police and told them Kobata had also gone missing.

Uchikado told police that Kobata had died on Wednesday morning, and he had put her under the flooring of a bedroom closet. Police found the body on Friday night and arrested Uchikado for illegally disposing of a corpse. The subsequent autopsy revealed she had fluid in her lungs, and investigators are still determining if she was murdered or died a natural death.

Police also found two decomposed bodies under the flooring of the home on Saturday, believed to be Kobata’s sister and mother. Uchikado has admitted to hiding Kobata’s body but denied disposing of her sister and mother’s bodies.

Police said that Kobata had collected her mother’s pension on her behalf over the last year. They also said that she had been seen asking people if she could borrow money many times. 

Wire reports