[Video Released] Daughter-in-Law Kills Mother-in-Law, Hides Body in Underfloor Storage… 10 Years of “Living Hell” as She Was Treated Worse Than a Cat by Her Family

Unable to bear the demands for money, he killed his mother-in-law

“The defendant had no way to escape the victim other than by committing the crime.”

As the defense attorney began his opening statement at the witness stand, the woman covered her face with both hands and began to cry—.

The trial was held at the Saitama District Court on [Month] [Day], ’25. The defendant was Harumi Tanaka (pseudonym; 55 at the time), who, unable to endure the treatment she had received for many years from her mother-in-law (68 at the time), impulsively took her life one day.

The incident came to light on [Date] [Year]. It began when the victim’s eldest daughter, who lived with her, called 110 to report, “My mother is dead.”The following day, Harumi Tanaka—the wife of the victim’s eldest son—was arrested on suspicion of abandoning a corpse. She later confessed, “I strangled my mother-in-law to death,” and was re-arrested on suspicion of murder.

During questioning, the defendant Tanaka stated, “I was grilled every day about hiding money, and I had reached my limit.”While the incident initially appeared to be simply the result of a strained relationship between a daughter-in-law and her mother-in-law, the trial revealed the anguish of the defendant Tanaka—who was cornered daily by the victim’s unfounded suspicions—and the “distorted family dynamics” underlying the situation, which eventually pushed her to her breaking point.

The sequence of events revealed at the first hearing was as follows.

After getting married, Defendant Tanaka had been living with her husband and son—a family of three—in Niigata City, but around 2014, they moved to a duplex apartment in Saitama City. At the apartment in Saitama City, her husband’s mother and two sisters joined them, and they lived together as a family of six. Defendant Tanaka reportedly occupied the lowest rung of the “family hierarchy.”

“The defendant’s mother-in-law, who became the victim, publicly declared, ‘I am the pillar of the Tanaka family.’ She ordered the defendant—who held the lowest status—to wake up by 5:00 a.m., gave detailed instructions on everything from the colors of the ingredients for her lunchbox to the number of dishes for dinner, and even made her report on when family members came and went from the house and whether they had eaten their meals” (from the defense counsel’s opening statement).

“I heard a snap inside my head.”

At one point, the defendant’s mother-in-law reportedly decided to try to get money from the defendant Tanaka’s parents’ home.

“I called her following the script my mother-in-law had devised and ordered her, ‘Go get money from your parents’ house.’ Between August 2018 and June 2021, Defendant Tanaka had her parents transfer more than 7.7 million yen to her, which she then handed over to her mother-in-law.“Tormented by the guilt of lying to her own mother to swindle money out of her, and the dilemma of being unable to disobey her mother-in-law’s orders, her mental state deteriorated to the point where she required treatment at a psychiatric clinic,” (ibid.)

The incident was triggered when, in 2023—more than five years after the 1.5 million yen was supposedly handed over in 2018—the mother-in-law claimed she “had not received it.” Her mother-in-law persistently pressured Defendant Tanaka to “hand over the remaining 1.5 million yen,” and refused to believe her even when Defendant Tanaka pointed out , “You must have checked my belongings to confirm this.” It is said that similar exchanges were repeated day after day.

Driven to the brink, on the morning of the incident, while arguing with his mother-in-law, Defendant Tanaka suddenly felt as if a fog had descended before his eyes, and his mother-in-law’s voice sounded distant to him.According to the defendant Tanaka , after she heard “a snapping sound in her mind, ” she suddenly strangled her mother-in-law to death with a plastic cord. She then hid the body in a storage space under the floor to prevent it from being found.

Since the defendant Tanaka had admitted to the crime, the trial focused on her motive for committing the act.

During the trial, she described the “hellish days” she endured within a family hierarchy headed by her mother-in-law, where she was treated as lower in status than a cat. She explained that, under her mother-in-law’s orders, she was forced to lie and constantly beg her own mother for money. She also expressed her inner conflict over having caused her mother-in-law nothing but trouble right up until her death.

At the sentencing hearing, the presiding judge stated, “I can understand the defendant’s feelings, ” acknowledging that she had been subjected to unjust demands for money and that “it is a fact that she was in an unreasonable situation, ” having been oppressed by her family on a daily basis.However, the judge ruled that “it is difficult to argue that she was in a situation where she had no choice but to commit murder, and she cannot escape a corresponding degree of blame, ” and sentenced Defendant Tanaka to seven years in prison without probation.The defense’s argument —that “there was no way to escape her mother-in-law’s violence other than murder” —was rejected, and the request for a suspended sentence was denied.

Throughout the trial, Defendant Tanaka had at times become emotionally distraught and even shed tears, but she reportedly listened to the verdict without changing her expression. What was going through her mind at that moment?

A YouTube video explains in detail the “distorted family relationship” between the defendant’s mother-in-law and Tanaka that came to light during the trial, as well as the mother-in-law’s actions in continuously extorting 7.7 million yen from the defendant.