Man Indicted 5 Years After Claiming Postpartum Breakdown for Allegedly Throwing Wife from 9th Floor

An unusual indictment has been filed.

On March 17, the Tachikawa branch of the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office indicted Jun Takahari (49), of unknown occupation, for murder. Takahari was arrested in February 2021 for throwing his wife, A (41 at the time), from the ninth floor of an apartment in Kunitachi, Tokyo, killing her. The following month, he was released by the Tachikawa branch of the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office with the case pending, but he was indicted five years later.

“From the time of his arrest, Takahari denied the charges. However, even after his release, the Metropolitan Police Department’s First Investigation Division and the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office continued voluntary investigations. They consulted multiple forensic experts, analyzed security camera footage, and repeatedly conducted reconstruction experiments of the incident. As a result, it was concluded that A had already lost consciousness when falling from the ninth floor, and that someone had caused her to fall from the balcony. This perspective seems to have led to the decision to indict him,” said a national newspaper judicial reporter.

“FRIDAY Digital” reported on the details of the incident immediately after Takahari’s arrest. Here is a look at the marital troubles with A and Takahari’s contradictory statements.

“I didn’t notice because we had quarreled”

Early morning, February 28, 2021. About ten investigators surrounded the apartment building. Just after 9 a.m., they simultaneously entered the building. The target man, wearing a jumper and sweats, came out of the room without resisting, casting a sharp gaze around. This was Takahari, accused of killing his wife by staging a fall.

The incident dates back to November 29 of the previous year (2020).

“On the morning of November 30, we received a 110 emergency call from Takahari. He said, ‘I went out to the balcony to smoke and found my wife collapsed below. I didn’t notice because we had quarreled the night before.’ When police and firefighters arrived at the scene, they found the body of a woman who appeared to have fallen from the ninth-floor balcony. A forensic autopsy revealed that the cause of death was multiple fractures from a strong blow to the chest,” said a national newspaper social affairs reporter.

The deceased was Takahari’s wife, A. Initially, Takahari explained to the police: “My wife was suffering from postpartum depression,” and “It seems she committed suicide.”

“Contradictory evidence to Takahari’s statements kept emerging. Examination of the body revealed marks on the neck suggesting strangulation, and slight bleeding on the eyelids consistent with suffocation. No fingerprints or fiber traces of A were found on the balcony railing.

Furthermore, it was discovered that the day before the incident, A had purchased online viewing tickets for a video by members of an idol group. Would someone contemplating ending their life buy such tickets the day before?” (ibid.)

“He was always nagging about money!”

At the time, when reporters conducted on-site inquiries, nearby residents said the following:

“That family had a young daughter. We often saw the mother (A-san) holding her daughter happily. She never seemed like someone struggling with child-rearing. But it seemed she and her husband constantly quarreled. I once heard the husband shouting, ‘He’s always nagging about money!’”

The social affairs reporter mentioned earlier added:

“Takahari apparently had large debts. To repay them, he sometimes even used A-san’s savings. That likely caused continuous trouble between the couple. It was also found that just before the incident, A-san contacted her mother saying something like, ‘I had a fight with Jun, it’s over, I’m scared.’ The police suspected that, amid a messy divorce dispute, Takahari may have strangled A-san to make her lose consciousness and then pushed her from the ninth floor.”

Taihei Ogawa, a former Kanagawa Prefectural Police detective and crime journalist, explains:

“Since this is not a case of non-prosecution, investigations continue even after the suspect is released. But an indictment five years later is unusually long. After the arrest last October of a suspect in a 1999 Nagoya female murder case, police and prosecutors seem to have become more proactive in investigating past crimes.

The fact that they decided to indict a defendant who continues to deny the charges shows the authorities have confidence. Cases that couldn’t previously be used as evidence can now be verified with improved techniques like DNA analysis, which can clarify facts supporting the crime.”

An indictment five years after release—The Tachikawa branch of the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office commented, “Investigations were conducted in view of the seriousness of the murder case.”