Japan Executes Man for 2009 Osaka Arson Killings
Justice Minister Hiroshi Hiraguchi said Takami’s execution followed careful review as Japan faces renewed criticism over secrecy and capital punishment.
- On Friday, August 21, Japan executed Sunao Takami for a 2009 arson attack on an Osaka pachinko parlor that killed five people, authorities said.
- The hanging is Japan's first since Takahiro Shiraishi, the "Twitter killer," was executed in June 2025; Takami doused the parlor with petrol before igniting it.
- There are around 100 inmates on death row, though Japanese law requires executions within six months of final verdict; inmates learn of execution only on the morning of death.
- In a 2024 government survey, 83 per cent saw the death penalty as "unavoidable," though support for abolition rose to 17 per cent from 9 per cent five years earlier.
- Japan and the United States remain the only Group of Seven countries using capital punishment; campaigners criticize the system for "hostage justice" and cite wrongful convictions like Iwao Hakamada's.
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A 58-year-old man has been executed in Japan, which was announced by Minister of Justice Hiraguchi in Tokyo.
Japan executes a man convicted of setting fire that killed 5 at a pachinko parlour in Osaka
A man who killed five people by setting fire to a pachinko parlour in 2009 was hanged Friday in Japan’s first execution by Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi‘s government as the country faces growing calls for more transparency and the abolition of capital punishment.
This is the first execution in Japan since Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi came to power last October. The previous one, that of Takahiro Shiraishi, the "Twitter Killer", who had murdered and dismembered nine people, was back in June 2025. Sunao Takami, the 58-year-old man executed on Friday, had watered a pachinko room - a sort of vertical billiard game using metal balls - in Osaka, near his home, before setting fire to it, killing four customers…
After more than a year, the Tokyo government has again executed a death sentence, the first execution since the entry into office of Prime Minister Takaichi.
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