Photo/Illutration Sociologist Shinji Miyadai speaks at the Tokyo College of Music in Tokyo’s Meguro Ward on Jan. 30. (Sayuri Ide)

A man suspected of repeatedly stabbing sociologist Shinji Miyadai at a university campus in Tokyo last November has committed suicide, the Metropolitan Police Department said on Feb. 1.

The man apparently died in mid-December, but police said they only recently learned about his death.

The suspect was 41 years old and lived with his parents in Sagamihara, Kanagawa Prefecture, according to investigators. They have not revealed his name.

His mother found him hanging in a house about 300 meters from her home on Dec. 17, police said. A suicide note was left, but it didn’t mention the attack on Miyadai.

Miyadai, a 63-year-old professor at Tokyo Metropolitan University, was stabbed multiple times on his face, legs and other body parts at the school’s Minami-Osawa campus in Hachioji, a city in western Tokyo, at 4:17 p.m. on Nov. 29.

He also suffered many defensive wounds on both arms.

When asked about the assailant, Miyadai was quoted as saying, “I have no idea who this man is.”

Police collected footage from security cameras around the area and found the suspected attacker had used a bicycle. They traced the bicycle to the man in Sagamihara.

He was a large person. And the man captured by security cameras was 180 to 190 centimeters tall.

His family members told investigators that he was acting strange, including having difficulty eating, since Dec. 12 when the Miyadai case became an open attempted-murder investigation.

Police are investigating whether an ax found at his home was used in the attack.

Police twice released footage of the suspect, once in December and again in January. They had received around 300 pieces of information by Feb. 1.

The MPD informed Miyadai about the death of the suspect on the morning of Feb. 1. The professor was left with a number of unanswered questions, particularly concerning the motive for the attack.

“Now I feel it’s difficult to resume my old life,” Miyadai said through a video streamed online on Feb. 1. “It’s disappointing that I have to move on with the unsatisfied feeling that I have not solved the problem.”

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