Photo/Illutration Yumiko Sugiuchi, right, chief of Saga prefectural police, and Tomohiro Suzuki, a senior official with the police department, hold a news conference in Saga on Oct. 23. (Hisashi Omura)

SAGA--Saga prefectural police are investigating the inaction of officers in response to relatives reporting 11 times the suspected habitual assault of a woman, who was later found dead in a car last year.

Police officials said they are examining the response of investigators at the time when relatives reported the violence and extortion against Rumi Kohata, who was residing with two others. 

At an Oct. 23 news conference, Tomohiro Suzuki, a senior official with Saga prefectural police, offered deep condolences to Kohata’s bereaved family.

“We are in the middle of confirming facts and will announce our findings as soon as possible,” he said.

Kohata’s mother expressed frustration over the inaction by police.

“Saga prefectural police did not take our complaints seriously,” she told The Asahi Shimbun. “If they had listened to what we said, the incident would not have occurred.”

Kohata’s body was discovered in a car at a parking lot in Dazaifu, Fukuoka Prefecture, on the early morning of Oct. 20, 2019.

Kohata, 36, who was unemployed, suffered numerous stab wounds and bruises all over her body and died of wound shock, according to an autopsy by Fukuoka prefectural police.

Fukuoka prefectural police arrested and indicted Miyuki Yamamoto, a 41-year-old woman, and Tsubasa Kishi, a 25-year-old man, on charges of abandoning her body, causing injury resulting in death and confinement in connection with her death. Yamamoto and Kishi, who were both unemployed, lived with Kohata. 

Yamamoto’s acquaintance, Masaki Tanaka, 47, a truck driver residing in Chikugo, Fukuoka Prefecture, was also arrested and indicted on charges of instructing the two suspects to abandon her body.

Police later determined that the suspects had allegedly repeatedly assaulted Kohata, striking her buttocks with a wooden sword and stabbing her in the thigh with a butterfly knife, according to investigative sources. 

Kohata, who was driven to a state where she could no longer offer resistance due to excessive violence, was forced by the suspects to ask her relatives and acquaintances for money.

Yamamoto is also charged with extorting a total of 1 million yen ($10,000) from the victim.

Yamamoto and Tanaka are also under indictment for attempting to extort money from Kohata’s husband.

Fukuoka prefectural police confirmed that Kohata’s relatives, including her husband, consulted with police in Tosu, Saga Prefecture, where her home was located, about her case on many occasions prior to her death.

It was found that they did so on 11 occasions.

They reported that Kohata was asking for money totaling millions of yen from relatives and that Yamamoto and other suspects were manipulating her.

Relatives also presented a recording of a phone call in which Tanaka, who identified himself as a member of a gang, demanded that they pay money. However, police in Saga Prefecture did not open a probe into the complaint as a possible criminal case.

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