The Metropolitan Police Department on Jan. 13 placed a 34-year-old Aum follower on a nationwide wanted list.According to investigators, Akemi Saito is suspected of assisting the flight of a 33-year-old convict linked to the shooting of Takaji Kunimatsu, the National Police Agency's director general. She allegedly delivered 1 million yen to Makoto Hirata, a physician who is now convicted of crimes linked to the cult, at a coffee shop in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward on or around May 7, 1995.Police say she knew then that Hirata had performed a surgical procedure to alter the fingerprints of another Aum follower now serving a prison term for confining and killing attorney Kiyoshi Kariya. Saito, who had worked at an Aum hospital in Tokyo's Nakano Ward since September 1993, went into hiding after police raided and searched Aum facilities in March 1995.
