OSAKA -- A former maid and her male acquaintance were sentenced Wednesday to life in prison for robbing and strangling her employer in 1999 in Suita, Osaka Prefecture, and dumping his body in Aomori Prefecture.
The Osaka District Court handed down the sentences to 36-year-old Mayumi Nakao and 33-year-old Tsuguhiro Yamamoto, a machinist, as demanded by prosecutors.
In July 1999, Nakao and Yamamoto, both heavily indebted, laced 62-year-old Mitsuhiko Kubota's lunch with sleeping drugs before strangling him, according to the court.
The pair later withdrew about 5.5 million yen from Kubota's bank accounts and dumped the body, tied to a concrete block, from a wharf in Aomori, the court said.
The pair admitted their guilt during the trial.