When the most heinous crime is carried out, families of the deceased can be struck by intense media attention, often against their will.
“The more time goes by, the deeper my sorrow of not having my daughter here,” says Fumiko Isogai, a 69-year-old resident of Nagoya, whose only daughter Rie was killed 13 years ago at the age of 31.
In August 2007, Rie was abducted on a street in Nagoya, robbed, killed and abandoned on a mountain in Gifu Prefecture by three men who met through an online underground bulletin board used to solicit accomplices for committing crimes. One of the men, Tsukasa Kanda, received the death penalty and was executed.