A court agreed Friday to suspend the detention of a Peruvian man arrested in connection with the murder of a couple in Kumagaya, where six people were found dead in one neighborhood in September, prosecutors said.
The detention of Vayron Jonathan Nakada Ludena, 30, will be suspended until 2 p.m. on Nov. 20 so the suspect can undergo treatment for a head injury, on condition that he will not leave the hospital, they said.
An investigative source said the suspect underwent head surgery for his injury Friday.
The Saitama Summary Court accepted the prosecutors' request to suspend his detention under the Code of Criminal Procedure that provides that a court may allow the temporary release of a suspect from detention for medical treatment or other reasons.
A police officer will watch over the suspect in the hospital but the officer is not authorized to detain him, the prosecutors said.
Nakada was arrested Oct. 8 on suspicion of fatally stabbing Minoru Tasaki, 55, and his wife Misae, 53, on Sept. 14 at their home in Kumagaya, Saitama Prefecture.
The police are also investigating his possible involvement in the murders of four others — Miwako Kato, 41, and her two daughters, 7-year-old Haruka and 10-year-old Misaki, as well as Kazuyo Shiraishi, 84 — as footprints found at the three murder sites were similar to those of the suspect.
Investigators earlier said the man has denied killing any of the six.
The police did not initially serve an arrest warrant, as Nakada remained unconscious in hospital after plunging from a second-floor window at the Kato house on Sept. 16. He regained consciousness on Sept. 24.
He was discharged from hospital and was immediately arrested on Oct. 8, but was hospitalized again on Oct. 15 based on a doctor's assessment.
