Photo/Illutration Serial killer Takahiro Shiraishi sent this image of himself to a woman online just before his arrest in 2017. (Provided by a related person)

A man who sexually assaulted and murdered eight suicidal females after falsely promising to die with them was executed on June 27, the first death sentence carried out in Japan in three years.

Takahiro Shiraishi, 34, was executed by hanging at the Tokyo Detention House, Justice Minister Keisuke Suzuki said at a news conference.

Shiraishi was convicted of various crimes, including sexual assault, robbery and murder, after the dismembered bodies of eight females and one male were found in and around his apartment in Zama, Kanagawa Prefecture, in 2017.

“The case has caused a great shock to society by taking nine precious lives in a period of about two months for selfish reasons of sexual and financial gratification,” Suzuki said.

“It is a regrettable incident for the bereaved families. As minister of justice, I have ordered the execution after careful and cautious consideration,” he said.

Suzuki said he signed the death penalty order on June 23.

This was the first execution since July 2022 and the first under Suzuki, who was named justice minister in November last year.

Shiraishi targeted the females after learning through their Twitter posts that they were thinking about killing themselves.

He offered to assist or join them in suicide, posting such things as, “Won’t you die with me?”

After they showed up at his apartment, he sexually assaulted them, strangled them and took their money and other possessions.

Shiraishi mutilated the bodies and dumped them in a garbage dump and other places. Bags of body parts were discovered in his home.

The eight females, from 15 to 26 years old, lived in Tokyo, Fukushima, Gunma, Saitama and Kanagawa prefectures. They were killed between August and October 2017.

The lone male victim was an acquaintance of one of the missing women. Shiraishi killed him after the man retraced her steps to Zama.

At trial, the defense sought a lesser sentence, arguing that the victims had consented to being killed by Shiraishi.

In December 2020, the Tokyo District Court’s Tachikawa Branch ruled that the victims were ambushed by Shiraishi, and none of them consented to being murdered.

On the question concerning Shirashi’s mental competence, the court concluded that the defendant “consistently acted in a manner that served his purpose.”

He lured the victims for the purpose of robbing them of their possessions and satisfying his sexual desires, the court said, and he dumped the bodies to destroy evidence.

Shiraishi planned his crimes by studying how to kill people and dismember their bodies, and he prepared the necessary tools, the court said.

The ruling concluded that capital punishment was unavoidable in this case.

The court said the way in which Shiraishi tricked mentally weak victims was “nothing short of devious and despicable.”

It described his killing spree as “one of the most egregious in the history of crime.”

The defense appealed the sentence, but Shiraishi withdrew it. His death sentence was finalized in January 2021.

Before Shiraishi’s execution, there had been no death sentences carried out under four consecutive justice ministers since August 2022, when Yasuhiro Hanashi took the Cabinet post.

Japan now has 105 inmates on death row.