Shoko Asahara, born Chizuo Matsumoto, was the founder and leader of the Japanese doomsday cult known as Aum Shinrikyo. He was convicted of masterminding the 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway, and was also involved in several other crimes. Asahara was sentenced to death in 2004, and his final appeal failed in 2011. In June 2012, his execution was postponed due to further arrests of Aum members. He was ultimately executed along with other senior members of Aum Shinrikyo on July 6, 2018.
Ikeda is a city in Osaka Prefecture, Japan. As of 31 March 2023, the city had an estimated population of 103,064 in 49723 households and a population density of 4700 persons per km². The total area of the city is 22.14 square kilometres (8.55 sq mi). It is a suburban city of Osaka City and a part of the Kyoto-Osaka-Kobe metropolitan area.
Amagasaki is an industrial city located in Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. As of 30 November 2022, the city had an estimated population of 455,555 in 223812 households, and a population density of 9000 persons per km². The total area of the city is 50.72 km2 (19.58 sq mi).
The Tokyo subway sarin attack was an act of domestic terrorism perpetrated on 20 March 1995, in Tokyo, Japan, by members of the cult movement Aum Shinrikyo. In five coordinated attacks, the perpetrators released sarin on three lines of the Tokyo Metro during rush hour, killing 13 people, severely injuring 50, and causing temporary vision problems for nearly 1,000 others. The attack was directed against trains passing through Kasumigaseki and Nagatachō, where the National Diet is headquartered in Tokyo.
Distance is the third studio album by Japanese singer Hikaru Utada. Toshiba EMI released it on March 28, 2001, making it her second release with the label. Utada wrote and co-produced the majority of the album, alongside previous collaborators Akira Miyake and her father Teruzane Utada, as well as new collaborations with American producers Rodney Jerkins and Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis. Distance, like its predecessor First Love (1999), is influenced by pop music and R&B, with additional hip-hop, rock music, reggae, and techno influences from Western music.
The Neomugicha incident, also known as the Nishi-Tetsu busjacking incident is the name given to the hijacking of a Japanese bus by a user of the internet forum 2channel on May 3rd, 2000.
Kenta Kobayashi, known mononymously as Kenta, is a Japanese professional wrestler. He currently works for New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), where he is a member of the Bullet Club stable. A former amateur kickboxer, Kobayashi's wrestling style is based upon strong kicks and strikes. Kobayashi pioneered both the Go 2 Sleep and Busaiku Knee kick finishing manoeuvres, later popularized by CM Punk and Bryan Danielson, respectively.
Mamoru Takuma was a Japanese mass murderer who killed eight children in the Ikeda school massacre in Ikeda, Osaka Prefecture, on 8 June 2001.
"Final Distance" is a song by Japanese recording artist Hikaru Utada for her third studio album Deep River (2002). Written by Utada herself, the song was produced and composed by long-time collaborators Akira Miyake, Utada's father Teruzane Utada and herself. "Final Distance" was originally recorded as "Distance" which was taken from the album with the same name, despite not being a single. The song was re-recorded, re-arranged, and dedicated to Rena Yamashita, a six-year-old victim of the Ikeda school massacre who had written an essay about being inspired by Utada. Utada had stated that the meaning of the word "final" for the song "Final Distance" is "most important" rather than "last."
Masami Kobayashi was an admiral in the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War II. His name was sometimes misspelled as "Marasmi Kobayashi" or "Marashi Kobayashi" by contemporary United States Navy sources. He was an outspoken proponent of the Treaty Faction within the Imperial Japanese Navy.
The Akihabara massacre was an incident of mass murder that took place on 8 June 2008, in the Akihabara shopping quarter in Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. The perpetrator, 25-year-old Tomohiro Katō of Susono, Shizuoka, drove into a crowd with a rented truck, initially killing three people and injuring two; he then stabbed at least twelve people using a dagger, killing four other people and injuring eight.
Atsushi Sakahara is a film director, writer, and producer. He now teaches at Kyoto Seika University and graduate program at Osaka City University. He is a former advertising executive at Dentsu inc who survived the 1995 sarin gas attacks in Tokyo, which led to his later film work. He produced the 2001 Short Film Palme d'Or winning Bean Cake, directed by David Greenspan. He directed a short film, Don't Call Me Father. in 2012. One of producers for the film was Paul Milgrom, who won Nobel Prize in Economics in 2020. In 2015 he began to work on what would become Me and the Cult Leader, a film following his pursuit of truth and justice by talking and travelling with current Aleph executive Araki Hiroshi. He is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in engineering at Utsunomiya University's school of regional development and creativity. He is also known as an inventor of the SA method, which is a unique idea-generation technique and application. He is a member of The Japan P.E.N Club. Olivia Rosenthal, a french novelist interviewed him in 2018 and released a novel based on it in 2022. He co-founded LOGIGLISH Inc.., a language education company, with Kaho Fujikawa, his student at Osaka Metropolitan University. He founded Sarin Gas Attack Victims Association in 2022 for his experience that he was anti-democratically not allowed to join Tokyo Subway Sarin Gas Attack Victims Association represented by a widow without any particular reasons and list Japan National Police Agency in 2023.
Events in the year 1994 in Japan. It corresponds to Heisei 6 (平成6年) in the Japanese calendar.
Events in the year 1971 in Japan. It corresponds to Shōwa 46 (昭和46年) in the Japanese calendar.
The Sagamihara stabbings were committed on 26 July 2016 in Midori Ward, Sagamihara, Kanagawa, Japan. Nineteen people were killed and twenty-six others were injured, thirteen severely, at a care home for disabled people. The crimes were committed by a 26-year-old man, identified as Satoshi Uematsu, a former employee of the care facility. Uematsu surrendered at a nearby police station with a bag of knives and was subsequently arrested. Justin McCurry of The Guardian described the attack as one of the worst crimes committed on Japanese soil in modern history. Uematsu was sentenced to death on 16 March 2020, after the prosecution sought the maximum penalty for murder in his trial; as of July 2022, he was on death row awaiting execution. As of 2023, it is currently the deadliest mass stabbing in Japanese history.
The Kawasaki stabbings occurred on the morning of 28 May 2019 in the Tama ward of Kawasaki City, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan, four blocks west of Noborito Station. Two people were murdered, and 18 others were injured after being stabbed at a city bus stop by 51-year-old Ryuichi Iwasaki. After carrying out the attack, Iwasaki committed suicide by stabbing himself in the neck.
A mass stabbing incident occurred 6 August 2021, on a commuter train in the Odakyu Electric Railway in Tokyo, Japan. 10 people were injured in the incident.
At around 8 p.m. JST on 31 October 2021, 24-year-old Kyota Hattori carried out a knife and arson attack on a Keiō Railway train as it was travelling to Kokuryō Station on the Keiō Line in Chōfu, a city in the western suburbs of Tokyo, Japan. He injured 17 people, one critically. Japanese authorities later identified Hattori and he was arrested at the scene.
