A 39-year-old man who went on a stabbing spree in Tokyo in 2008 and killed seven people was executed by Japan.
One of the most horrifying mass killings in the nation's recent memory was performed by Tomohiro Kato.
Three people were killed after he drove a vehicle into a group of people out for lunch in the Akihabara retail area when he was 25 years old.
Then, brandishing a blade, he stabbed bystanders, leaving four dead and eight injured.
Police detained him there, and he eventually confessed to his acts during his trial, claiming that he had been enraged by internet taunting.
At the time, the incident triggered a heated discussion in Japanese culture about random killings, online influence, and the shortcomings of young people's mental health services. In consequence, knife-related laws were also made more stringent.
Eight years after Kato was given the death penalty, the authorities announced on Tuesday that Kato had been put to death.
"The matter has been thoroughly adjudicated by the courts, and their ruling was that the defendant should be executed. I've thought about this situation with the utmost care, "Yoshihisa Furukawa, the minister of justice, stated during a news conference.
In the Tokyo Detention Center, Kato was hung. At 2015, he unsuccessfully sought to have the sentence commuted in Japan's top court.
At the time of his detention, Kato provided the following statement to the police: "I came to Akihabara to commit murder. It made no difference who I killed."
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Kato was raised in an affluent home and attended a prestigious high school. But after failing his admission tests to the university, he had trouble finding consistent work.
Prosecutors also portrayed a troubled young man over the course of the defendant's trial, one who had expressed his rage and social alienation on several occasions in online forums.
Kato, according to the prosecution, was particularly discouraged when one online conversation partner stopped emailing him. He had made his plan to commit a mass murder known as he entered the city on the day of the assault.
He was punished in 2011 by the Tokyo District Court, which stated that his savage act lacked "a shred of compassion."
Despite opposition from global and regional human rights organizations, Japan is one of the few wealthy nations that still employs the death sentence.
Three individuals were executed there in December. The nation's first execution of the year occurred in Kato's case.
More than 100 inmates continue to be on death row.
On Tuesday, Mr. Furukawa defended the usage of the death penalty in his nation "I regret that the use of the death penalty is still essential since horrific acts never stop. Therefore, it would not be proper to repeal the punishment."
When Prime Minister Fumio Kishida took office in late 2021, Japan's executions were restarted. Before it, there had not been any executions in the nation in two years.
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