David Peace - Occupied City

Mass Murder Suspect Cleared; Police Baffled; Suspect’s Arrest Raises Civil Rights Issue

Horizaki Shigeki of the First Criminal Investigative Section of the Metropolitan Police Board yesterday expressed the hope of releasing Hirasawa Sadamichi from custody sometime the same evening. Officials of the Tokyo Procurators Office said after cross-examining Hirasawa that two major points still need to be cleared up relative to Hirasawa’s action at the time of the crime and subsequently. The first was said to be Hirasawa’s alibi as to what he was doing on January 26, the date of the crime. The other puzzling point, they said, was the suspect’s construction of a new home and the fact that he possessed ¥45,000 in cash at home, which he alleges to have borrowed from a friend .

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The seven-month-old question as to who perpetrated the diabolic Teikoku Bank ‘poison holdup case’ remained a baffling mystery today following the clearance of Hirasawa Sadamichi from suspicion as being the long-sought criminal .

Hopes entertained by police authorities, especially Inspector Ikki, who made the arrest and went so far as saying that Hirasawa’s guilt was ‘100 per cent certain’, fell dismally flat Monday evening when 11 persons who saw the Teigin criminal could find no resemblance in the much-publicized latest suspect .

Although the ‘screening’ was conducted under a tense atmosphere and all who saw Hirasawa were given ample time to make up their minds, not a single person charged the water-colour artist as being the Teikoku Bank criminal .

Six of them, in fact, were certain that he was not the man who committed the diabolic crime .

Hirasawa was the fourth important suspect directly questioned by the Metropolitan Police Board in connection with the Teikoku Bank ‘poison holdup case’ .

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Meanwhile, Government and police authorities appear destined to face sharp criticism from numerous public organizations on the charge of failing to safeguard basic civil rights in the event investigations should clear latest Teigin suspect Hirasawa Sadamichi of all association with the Teikoku Bank ‘poison holdup case’ .

Lessening of suspicion against Hirasawa has switched public attention to the issue of basic civil rights concerning police action and the indignities to which the latest suspect was subjected .

Already, two civic organizations — the Tokyo Bar Association and the Free People’s Rights League — are reported to be preparing a campaign of protest against Government authorities for their action against Hirasawa in the event the latter should be freed of all suspicion .

Both of these bodies favour the institution of legal action against the Government on behalf of Hirasawa to obtain payment of damages or a formal apology from authorities for their failure to uphold basic civil rights in the latest case .

In this connection, Attorney General Suzuki Yoshio admitted that the incident involving Hirasawa’s arrest may enmesh the Government in a suit for payment of damages on the charge of failure to safeguard basic civil rights .

The Attorney General said he personally felt that officials associated in the manhunt possessed ample suspicion for carrying out the arrest but it had been ‘imprudent’ for them to have prematurely disclosed their action .

He said, moreover, that there appeared justification in criticism levelled against the remark by Police Inspector Ikki that he was ‘100 per cent certain’ that Hirasawa was the criminal who perpetrated the Teikoku Bank case. Authorities of the Metropolitan Police Board, on the other hand, defended their action relative to Hirasawa. They stressed that they had secured enough incriminating information to arrest Hirasawa, although they felt that Police Inspector Ikki had gone ‘a bit too far’ in making a flat personal statement of his view. But Tanaka Eiichi, Inspector-General of the Police, also pointed out that police had done no wrong in handcuffing Hirasawa in the course of bringing him to Tokyo from Otaru. He said that such a measure was duly provided in police regulations in such instances .

I look up from the paper. I turn around from my desk, my editor standing over my shoulder, and I say, ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Hirasawa’s just tried to kill himself …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, in the genkan to her house, she takes her hand from her mouth and she asks, ‘Why? What happened?’

‘Apparently Hirasawa had a piece of glass on him,’ I tell her. ‘And sometime this afternoon he tried to sever the artery of his left wrist with the piece of glass and with the point of a pen …’

‘Is he all right?’ she asks. ‘Will he survive?’

‘Yes,’ I tell her. ‘Luckily, Hirasawa wasn’t alone at the time. There were other prisoners in the cell with him and so they raised the alarm. Doctors were quickly in the cell and they were able to bandage his artery before there was any great loss of blood. So he’ll live.’

‘Why?’ she asks again. ‘It’s not him. He’s innocent?’

‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘But I’m going to find out…’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, down an alley off the main street, on the sofa at the back of the room, I say, ‘I thought Hirasawa was in the clear. I thought they were going to release him …’

‘I told you it was a set-up.’

‘And so this is all part of the set-up, is it?’ I ask. ‘The suicide attempt, keeping him locked up like this?’

‘They won’t give up,’ he says. ‘Especially not now, not now there’s all this talk of his civil rights, of suits and of damages. They’ll find other crimes, other crimes to investigate, other crimes to detain him on. They’ll never give up …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, they don’t give up, they never give up:

4 FRAUD VICTIMS IDENTIFY ARTIST

Police to Indict Suspect in Teikoku Bank Case on Four Charges

TOKYO, Sept. 2 — Hirasawa Sadamichi, 56, well-known water-colour artist, who is now held at the Metropolitan Police Board as a suspect in the Teikoku Bank mass poisoning murders, is expected to be indicted in a few days on charges of absconding with a deposit book issued by the Marunouchi branch of the Mitsubishi Bank and committing three abortive attempts fraudulently to secure money with it .

The discovery that the latest Teigin suspect had been engaged in such unlawful practices was bared by Prosecutor Takagi of the Tokyo district prosecutor’s office as a sequel to further intensive police investigations into Hirasawa’s past activities .

The four persons said to be victims of his acts have identified him and this has brought hope to the long-harassed police that these cases may lead to the murder case. For it appears that there was some extremely pressing need for Hirasawa to obtain at least ¥100,000 and thus might have made him desperate enough not to stop at murder. Another point about these charges is that they invariably have to do with banks .

The police still cannot say as yet whether they believe Hirasawa to be the Teikoku Bank murderer but the attempted swindles, with one connected with a branch of the Teikoku Bank, place him under the case will be continued with heavy suspicion. Investigation on Hirasawa held on the four charges .

HIRASAWA HELD ON FRAUD CHARGE

Authorities Still Pinning High Hopes of Linking Artist with Bank Case

TOKYO, Sept . 5 — The Tokyo District Public Procurator’s Office Friday prosecuted Hirasawa Sadamichi, water-colour artist and the latest suspect in the Teikoku Bank holdup-murder case, for falsification of private documents and fraud to which he has confessed, as the period for its investigation of the man as a Teigin murder suspect expired .