Tokyo girl, 16, found dead and stabbed in over 10 places

A missing 16-year-old girl from Tokyo whose body was found in a wardrobe in a house in central Japan earlier this week had more than 10 stab wounds to her back, with the suspect claiming the attack stemmed from a dispute over an online game, investigative sources said on Wednesday.

Police suspect Masaki Eguchi, the 21-year-old resident of the house in Ichinomiya, Aichi Prefecture, of the frenzied attack. Eguchi has already been arrested for allegedly abandoning the girl’s body and was sent to prosecutors on Wednesday.

The body was found on Monday and identified the next day as that of the missing girl, Waka Kato.

Eguchi has admitted to the charge of abandonment of a body, the police said. The sources said he also confessed to stabbing Kato “multiple times” with a knife at his home, claiming to have had “trouble” with her over an online game.

An autopsy revealed she died of haemorrhagic shock.

When Kato left her home in Tokyo on Friday, she told her family she was planning to visit a friend in Aichi whom she had met through an online game, according to the sources. She was reported missing on Saturday by her family after they lost contact with her.