Original] Kashiwa, Chiba – Murder of a Couple and Burning Down of a House: Suspect’s Relatives Reveal “Motive for the Incident and Police Failure”.

Half a Life of Repeated Theft and Incarceration

On December 11, a resident of Kashiwa City, Chiba Prefecture, known as a bedroom community for Tokyo, witnessed a heated argument between an elderly man and woman in a residential area in the Takayanagi district, about 15 minutes by car southeast of JR Kashiwa Station.

You’re going to get cheated again, aren’t you?

The woman asked him firmly, and the man shouted back, “If you were cheated, I wouldn’t be able to get away with it, would I?

If he cheated you again, I’ll never forgive you.

I’ll kill him, and then I’ll die too.

The tragedy took place one week later, on December 18.

Shortly after 6:00 p.m., a fire broke out in a rented house where the man and woman had been arguing, and eight houses, including those nearby, were destroyed. Meanwhile, shortly before this fire, Toshiaki Watarai, 59, and his wife Reiko, 59, who lived in the house, were stabbed to death in a house about 600 meters away.

The next day, Chiba Prefectural Police arrested a resident of the burned rented house, Kaoru Sakamaki, 77, a suspect of unknown occupation whose whereabouts were being sought on arson charges, for obstruction of public order. The prefectural police are investigating the possibility that this man may have knowledge of the couple’s murder as well.

In the order of the incidents, Sakamaki is suspected of setting fire to the couple’s house after killing them. If he is the culprit in this series of incidents, why did he act this way? And is there any connection between the incident and the altercation witnessed a week earlier?

FRIDAY Digital was recently able to speak with a person who knows Sakamaki and is very close to him. The person’s story reveals that Sakamaki’s behavior prior to the incident was muddled.

Sakamaki was released from Yokohama Prison at the end of November. He had been in prison perhaps eight times before, often caught for theft, such as shoplifting groceries from a supermarket. He had a kind of kleptomania (a propensity to steal), and when he became frustrated, he would relieve his stress by stealing.

After his release from prison, Sakamaki returned to a rented house in the Takayanagi district, where he had a wife and had been accompanying her for over 30 years. Even before entering prison, however, he had repeatedly engaged in domestic violence, beating his wife and stepdaughters, cursing them loudly, and even pointing a kitchen knife at them on one occasion,” said a source.

The woman who was seen arguing with him a week before the incident is believed to be his wife. On the other hand, the Sakamaki’s and Watarai’s families are distant relatives.

Mr. Sakamaki’s family was the landowner of that area. His mother had a son-in-law who took over the family. His mother, who was still alive and well until a few years ago, doted on Mr. Sakamaki and gave him money by selling land she owned for him.

About 20 years ago, Mr. Sakamaki sold the land for about 17 million yen to Mr. Watarai, who was in the real estate business and had known him since his father’s time. At that time, Mr. Sakamaki loaned Mr. Tokai, who was having financial difficulties, 7 million yen from the proceeds of the land sale.

Purchased a luxury car each time he was released from prison

When Mr. Watarai borrowed money from Sakamaki, he also prepared an IOU. However, the repayments did not go according to the original plan, and on one occasion Mr. Tokai visited Sakamaki accompanied by his wife and children to apologize for the delay in repayment as a family.

On another occasion, Mr. Watarai borrowed about 2 million yen from Sakamaki. It is possible that a certain looseness in the handling of money shaped Sakamaki’s view of Ms. Tokai.

On the other hand, Sakamaki’s lifestyle was not covered by the family’s assets.

Sakamaki loves cars and has owned a string of luxury vehicles, including a Toyota Crown Athlete and a Nissan Gloria, each costing no less than 4 million yen. Mr. Sakamaki’s propensity to steal is uncontrollable, and for this reason he has spent half his life in and out of prison repeatedly, but every time he is released he buys a new car.

Because of this extravagant spending, when he was released from prison in late November of this year, he and his wife had only about 2 million yen in assets.

Immediately after his release from prison, Sakamaki once said that he was “looking for a new job,” without regard for his 77 years of age. However, before he could establish a new foundation for his life, he decided to divorce his wife.

After he was released from prison, he began telling his wife, ‘I can make it on my own, so you, get out. I don’t know why he said that, but it was decided around December 6 that they would divorce.

Mr. Sakamaki then said, ‘If you divorce me, we’ll split the property fifty-fifty,’ and gave his wife half of the 2 million yen and told her to leave,” he said.

Even after divorcing his wife, however, Sakamaki’s selfish behavior continued.

Even after divorcing his wife, however, Sakamaki’s selfish behavior continued. I’m sorry for everything I’ve done. I’ve given up. I’m going to die. I’m going to die. He also told her that he had given the one million yen he had shared with his ex-wife to Toshi (Watarai), and that she should receive it from him.

Let us return to the scene on December 11. By that day, the ex-wife had visited Sakamaki’s home for the first time in several days, partly because she had been contacted by both Sakamaki and Mr. Watarai that they wanted to hand over 1 million yen. Sakamaki then called Mr. Tokai, saying, “I’ve given Toshi the money, so wait a minute,” but Mr. Tokai replied, “I’m not going out yet.

However, Mr. Tokai told Sakamaki that he was out of town and couldn’t get there right away. At first he said he would be there at 3:30 p.m., but then he pushed it back to 4:30 p.m., and finally he didn’t show up until after 6:00 p.m. Sakamaki had an angry expression on his face and looked shaken and bizarre, and since there was also the matter of domestic violence damage, we had to call the police.

According to this source close to Sakamaki, there is much that is unknown about how he spent his time from that day until the stabbing murders of Mr. and Mrs. Tokai.

If only they had arrested me then.”

It also remains unclear why Sakamaki tried to give his ex-wife one million yen.

Whenever he went to prison, he brought cash and bank books that he had with him at the time, and never let his ex-wife, who was waiting outside, touch them. He would then lie to his ex-wife that he needed 30,000 yen every month to live in prison, and then he would save the money and spend it when he was released.

He is extremely obsessed with money. Why did he try to give cash to his ex-wife this time?

Sakamaki is unable to withdraw deposits at the bank by himself, nor can he operate a rickety cell phone. After some time had passed since he decided to leave his wife, he may have been faced with the reality that he was old, had no job, and still had to live on his own, and he may have had some feelings about it,” he said.

After separating from his wife, Sakamaki often said, “I can’t live on my own. He often said, “I can’t live on my own. I should go to the police.

I think ‘going to the police’ means committing a familiar crime such as theft, getting locked up, and spending the rest of my life in prison. He realized that the next time he was incarcerated, he would end his life in prison. Therefore, he did not need the money, and that may be why he decided to give it to his ex-wife.

One week later, Sakamaki visited Mr. and Mrs. Tokai at their home and wondered what kind of feelings came up in their hearts. –One week later, he visited Mr. and Mrs. Watarai at their home.

One person close to Mr. Sakamaki told us that he had certain regrets when he agreed to be interviewed by this magazine.

On December 11, when Mr. Sakamaki and his wife had an argument, I was there when the police came to the scene. I appealed to the police officers to arrest Mr. Sakamaki for theft.

In fact, Mr. Sakamaki had stolen about 2,000 yen in cash from an acquaintance of his ex-wife’s that was in their home. Since we knew that Mr. Sakamaki was in an agitated state at that time and did not know what he was going to do, and we also knew that he was violent in the home, we thought it would be safer to have him arrested by the police under the pretext of theft.

However, this police officer did not move. I was worried, so I went to the Kashiwa police station on the same day and explained to them about Mr. Sakamaki’s theft. The police officer who was in charge of the case said that day, ‘I will make a statement at a later date, so could you please come to the station?

No progress was made since then regarding the investigation of Mr. Sakamaki’s theft, and as a result, that incident occurred. It is painful to think that if the police had arrested Mr. Sakamaki at that time, Mr. and Mrs. Watarai would not have died. …… I decided to do the interview because I wanted people to know that there had been this kind of interaction with the police leading up to the incident.”

Sakamaki, who was caught in the arson fire, suffered burns on the lower half of his body and part of his face and was temporarily hospitalized for treatment. He has now been discharged from the hospital and is expected to begin a full-scale investigation soon.

Interview and text by Naoyuki Miyashita
naoyukimiyashita@pm.me