Nagasaki prefectural police believe a man accused in a September murder case in Fukuoka Prefecture who earlier confessed to killing another person in Nagasaki 23 years ago was only lying.
The police concluded that Yoshifumi Tokumaru, 44, fabricated the second murder, citing a lack of evidence to support his story, according to investigation sources.
The sources said Tokumaru told the police: "I fought with a man I had just met in the city of Nagasaki and beat him to death. I buried his body in a cesspit near my house."
The police launched the investigation into the case after Tokumaru was indicted on charges of killing a female snack bar manager in Kurume, Fukuoka. But they failed to find a cesspit large enough to hide a human body in the residential area of Nagasaki described by Tokumaru.
Tokumaru told the police his friend was as an accomplice in the alleged crime, but it turned out that the "friend" did not exist, the sources said. Police have already concluded the probe into the case.
Tokumaru is currently standing trial over the September case. According to the indictment, Tokumaru strangled Yuriko Kusaba, 53, in her snack bar in Kurume on Sept. 17 and stole about 40,000 yen.
Tokumaru was arrested Sept. 20 on suspicion of failing to pay a bill at a snack bar in Kumamoto the previous night. He confessed to the police that he killed Kusaba and was served an additional arrest warrant on charges of murder and robbery.