Suicide leap at disciplinary school

NAGOYA — A 21-year-old man jumped to his death Monday in an apparent suicide at a sailing school in Mihama, Aichi Prefecture, that is known for its strict education program for troubled young people, police said.

The man jumped from the roof of a three-story dormitory at Totsuka Yacht School around 7:30 a.m., leaving a note on the roof terrace that read: "It's painful for me to live. I want to die," police said.

The Hiroshima Prefecture native, who joined the school in December 2010, climbed onto the roof while taking out garbage with another student, the police said.

At the school, which opened in 1976, a man in his 30s sustained serious injuries after jumping from the dormitory last month, while an 18-year-old girl jumped to her death in October 2009 after telling people around her that she wanted to die.

Before these incidents, the principal, Hiroshi Totsuka, was sentenced to six years in prison for physical abuse that led to the deaths of two of his charges and left two others missing in the early 1980s. He returned to the school following his release from prison in April 2006.