A 19-year-old youth was arrested Tuesday on suspicion of fatally stabbing a 64-year-old woman in Tokyo's Edogawa Ward in February, police sources said.
The teenager was arrested by an investigative squad from the Komatsugawa Police Station on suspicion of murdering Masako Mizuochi, who had hearing and speech difficulties, on a stairway at a Tokyo Metropolitan Government-run apartment complex where she lived, on the night of Feb. 1, the sources said.
The youth has confessed to the crime, the sources said.
According to police, Mizuochi was stabbed in the neck, back and other parts of her body on the staircase. She used sign language to plead to passersby for help.
She was taken to a hospital, where she died.