“I had no idea a woman lived in that house…” A 75-year-old man who murdered a 29-year-old woman… The “relationship” between the two revealed in court

The “female roommate” no one had ever seen

“I killed someone.”

The man who killed the woman living with him reportedly called the police himself to make this statement. However, all the neighbors said in unison , “We didn’t know a woman lived in that house, ” and appeared unable to hide their surprise—

On July 17, a verdict will be handed down at the Yokohama District Court to defendant Hiroshi Tanabe (75), who is charged with murder-for-hire. What has defendant Tanabe said in court so far?

The incident occurred on the morning of November 13, ’25.

“On November 13, the Kanagawa Police Station arrested defendant Tanabe, a restaurant owner, on suspicion of murder. He is accused of strangling and killing Aoi Shida (29) in the residential portion of his home-and-business premises at around 7:15 a.m. that same day.

About 30 minutes after the killing, he called 110 himself and said, ‘I killed someone.’Tanabe admitted to the charges, stating, ‘I strangled her. There’s no mistake about it,’ and reportedly testified, ‘Ms. Shida had said she wanted to die.’ Subsequently, Tanabe was indicted on charges of soliciting murder,” (a reporter from the crime desk of a national newspaper)

Immediately after the incident, a woman living in the neighborhood described the scene as follows:

“Around 8:00 a.m., I heard a tremendous siren. When I looked outside, I saw about 10 police cars parked there, and I could see an ambulance as well. Soon after, a young woman on a stretcher was taken away in the ambulance. “There’s only one entrance to Ms. Tanabe’s house, facing the main street. I hadn’t seen any women coming or going from there for about the past 10 years, so I was surprised to hear that a woman had been living in that house.”

What was the relationship between the deceased, Ms. Shida, and the defendant, Tanabe? According to his opening statement and other evidence, the reason they began living together was that he had met Ms. Shida’s mother around 2005. Regarding Ms. Shida’s mother, the defendant, Tanabe, stated the following:

“Hime (her mother) was a drinking buddy of mine. She worked at a restaurant and didn’t finish work until the middle of the night. Instead of going home, she’d stop by my shop, rest in the tatami room, and then head home at dawn to cook breakfast. Hime told me, ‘If anything ever happens to me, please take care of Aoi.’”

Her mother passed away about a year later. According to the defendant Tanabe, he discovered her body in the private room of the restaurant in the early morning.

Ms. Shida, Who Never Left the House

After that, Ms. Shida went to live with her grandparents, but around August 2018, she reportedly paid a sudden visit to Defendant Tanabe’s home. Defendant Tanabe described Ms. Shida’s appearance when she arrived at his home as follows.

“Around the time I was closing up the shop, Aoi (Ms. Shida) came in [to my house], panting and struggling to carry her heavy bag. The only thing she said at that moment was, ‘Is it okay?’ I replied, ‘Sure,’ and that marked the beginning of our eight-year life together.”

For the next eight years, Ms. Shida reportedly never set foot outside, spending her time looking at her smartphone or watching TV drama DVDs that the defendant Tanabe had rented. Although her grandparents once tried to persuade her to leave, Ms. Shida never left the defendant Tanabe’s home.

Around November 10, just before the incident, Defendant Tanabe testified in court that when he suggested to Ms. Shida, “Should we leave here (our home)?”, she asked him , “Please kill me.”

“She asked me, ‘Please strangle me for at least 30 minutes so I don’t come back to life,’” he said.After that, Aoi cut her hair short and asked me to ‘throw the cut hair away,’ and she also asked me to ‘buy her some sleeping pills.’ I realized she was truly thinking about dying, so I decided to kill Aoi and then kill myself,”

On the night of the 12th, the defendant Tanabe went to a nearby convenience store with Ms. Shida and purchased alcohol and other items. It was reportedly the first time in eight years that Ms. Shida had gone outside.

“Aoi said, ‘I want to see the view outside,’ so we went to the convenience store together. But Aoi’s physical strength had declined, so on the way back, her legs were shaking so much she couldn’t walk properly. I was supporting her, but right in front of our house, she suddenly collapsed to her knees and couldn’t stand up anymore.”

The next morning, when the defendant Tanabe woke up, Ms. Shida was still asleep. Thinking , “I guess it’s time to go through with it,” the defendant Tanabe wrapped a towel around her belt to leave no traces and strangled her. She called the police at 110, and the police arrived just as she was about to take her own life.

“Someone Close to Me, Someone Dear to Me”

Why did Ms. Shida suddenly say , “I want you to kill me”? According to the defendant Tanabe, she had never once said she wanted to die in the eight years prior to that.

The prosecutor repeatedly asked , “Why do you think Ms. Aoi wanted to die?” but the defendant only replied with answers such as, “I think she wanted to be reunited with her mother, ” or “I don’t know.” Defendant Tanabe stated that a certain remark by Ms. Shida was a major factor in his decision to kill her, but he did not reveal what those “words” were.

When asked , “Then why did you decide to kill yourself as well?” he replied, “I thought if Aoi were to die, I would die too.”

However, during police questioning immediately after the incident, Defendant Tanabe had made the following statement:

“I had been caring for my family for about 15 years, and I had spent a considerable amount of money on things like the funeral expenses for my older brother, who passed away two years ago. Combined with the fact that my shop’s sales had been declining, I began to feel ‘tired.’”

When the prosecutor brought up this statement and pressed him, asking, “Isn’t this also one of the reasons you wanted to die?” Defendant Tanabe simply replied, “No.”

However, it is known that Defendant Tanabe visited Ms. Shida’s grandparents’ home several times to ask for money. Although he claimed, “I don’t remember, ” the grandparents had consulted the police. Were financial hardships truly unrelated to the incident?

In his closing argument, the prosecutor pointed out, “The defendant committed the crime without even asking the victim for details about her situation; it was a rash act.”Citing points such as, “Had an appropriate environment been provided, it would have been entirely possible to dissuade the victim from taking her own life,” and “Whenever asked about facts that were disadvantageous to himself, he consistently gave vague statements such as ‘I don’t know,’” the prosecutor sought a “five-year prison sentence.”

On the other hand, the defense attorney stated, “When [the defendant Tanaka] said, ‘Let’s leave,’ the victim began to say, ‘I’m going to die here.’She pointed to the place where her mother had died, began to strongly wish to be reunited with her mother, and asked the defendant to ‘help her die,’ among other things, ” and argued that “a suspended sentence is appropriate” given Defendant Tanabe’s advanced age and other factors.

During the trial, Defendant Tanabe had spoken of Ms. Shida , saying, “After being together for eight years, I grew attached to her—she wasn’t a child, nor was she a girlfriend. She was simply someone who was there, someone important to me.”

However, he never answered the question the bereaved family most wanted to know: “Why did Aoi decide to take her own life?”

Why did Defendant Tanabe decide to kill Ms. Shida?

With the core of the matter left unaddressed, the verdict is scheduled to be handed down on the 17th.