Photo/Illutration Kenichi Hosoya, who is accused of murdering his daughter by poisoning, ventures outdoors on June 21, 2023, in Tokyo’s Taito Ward. (Minami Endo)

A child and family support center in Tokyo’s Taito Ward had received five reports about injuries to a girl before she died of poisoning last year.

Several signs showed that Yoshiki Hosoya was suffering from repeated abuse and neglect at home, and she had temporarily been taken into protective custody.

But the girl was eventually returned to her parents.

She was 4 years old when she died in March 2023.

Her father, Kenichi Hosoya, 43, and her mother, Shiho, 37, were arrested on Feb. 14 on suspicion of murdering the girl with poison.

The couple had been living with their three children, including Yoshiki, at an apartment in Taito Ward.

Officials of the Tokyo metropolitan government and the ward government held a briefing for reporters after the arrests. They explained the background of the family and Yoshiki’s case.

The Hosoya family moved from Chiba Prefecture to Taito Ward in October 2016, the officials said.

The ward’s child and family support center received a report from a municipality in Chiba Prefecture that the Hosoya couple “had a history of psychologically abusing their eldest daughter and son due to a marital quarrel,” the officials said.

Staff at the Taito Ward center had been working on the Hosoya case in cooperation with the metropolitan government’s child consultation center.

In January 2019, Yoshiki was born.

Two months later, Shiho was questioned by police for setting fire to clothing on the balcony of their apartment home.

After that, the metropolitan government’s child consultation center took custody of the three children.

Following multiple interviews with the couple, the center determined that Yoshiki and her parents “had been having good visitations.”

Yoshiki was returned to her parents in September that year.

Since March 2021, the ward had been receiving reports about the status of the children from Kenichi by phone.

But during a home visit by the ward’s staff, Shiho refused to respond.

From Sept. 1 to Nov. 4 in 2022, the ward received five reports from nursery schools about Yoshiki’s health condition.

The reports included descriptions like: scratches on cheeks and arms; a bump on the right forehead; a scratch on the left chin; a scratch around the right eye near the ear; a blue bump on the right cheek; a yellow bruise on the side of her left eye; and a scratch on the left cheek.”

The officials said Kenichi had explained that Yoshiki “scratched herself.”

Yoshiki told the center, “I fell in the park.”

In January 2023, a nursery school told the center multiple times that Yoshiki “appears to be deprived of sleeping.”

Other sources said the girl kept wearing the same clothing and was clearly not being bathed.

On March 13, 2023, Kenichi made an emergency call, saying, “My daughter is not breathing.” Yoshiki was transported to a hospital and was confirmed dead.

The two other children have been living apart from their parents.

A ward official said on Feb. 14 that the center had judged that Yoshiki was suffering from “neglect and psychological abuse.”

“Regarding her injuries, after listening to the father and the girl, we determined that they were not caused by violence,” the staff member said.

The ward’s center can provide a temporary window for child welfare, while the metropolitan government’s center is responsible for temporary protection and other specialized measures in accordance with the law.

The metropolitan government said it will review the measures taken by its child welfare council in Yoshiki’s case.

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