AICHI (TR) – The father of a 23-year-old woman who was crushed to death in July when a suicidal man plunged from an 11th-floor balcony has launched a petition demanding the jumper face murder charges, revealing the suspect admitted he “didn’t care” if he killed anyone, reports TV Asahi (Oct. 11).
Tomoki Inaba, a restaurant worker, was walking along a sidewalk with a friend in a bustling downtown district of Nagoya when the 29-year-old man landed directly on top of her. Experts estimate the force of the collision was between one and three tons. Tomoki died almost instantly.
The jumper initially fell into a coma but later recovered. He was arrested on suspicion of gross negligence resulting in death and is currently undergoing psychiatric evaluation to determine his criminal culpability.
“Willfull negligence”
However, the victim’s father, Kenji Inaba, refuses to accept his daughter’s death as a mere accident. Seeking answers, Kenji has visited the suspect three times in detention, where he says the man showed a chilling disregard for human life.
“He told me, ‘I’m sorry for what happened to your precious daughter,’ but honestly, anyone could say that,” Kenji said. “I asked him, ‘You jumped thinking you didn’t care if there were people below, or if they lived or died, right?’ And he replied, ‘Yes, that’s right.’ He jumped without caring if he took someone with him. I absolutely cannot accept this being brushed off as an accident.”
Kenji is pushing for prosecutors to upgrade the charge to murder based on “willful negligence” (mihitsu no koi). He argues the suspect knew the risks of jumping into a highly trafficked area. Kenji has personally staked out the scene of the tragedy, noting that even at 1:00 a.m. — the time of the incident — nearly 300 pedestrians passed through the area in under two hours.
“An act of murder”
An online petition demanding the harsher penalty, launched last month, has already garnered over 45,000 signatures.
Legal experts, however, warn of high hurdles. Lawyer Yasuo Sawai noted that proving murderous intent in a suicide jump is highly complex. “When jumping from the 11th floor, it is entirely unpredictable whether you will actually hit a pedestrian below,” Sawai explained. “Objectively proving this constitutes an act of murder is not easy.”
For Kenji, the fight is about ensuring the senseless tragedy isn’t swept under the rug. The day before she was killed, Tomoki had messaged her father on the Line app to arrange dinner — what would have been their first meal together in nine months.
“A third party is dead. I don’t want this treated as just an accident,” Kenji said. “If the current law cannot change that, then I want to see legal reforms that stand by the victims and their grieving families.”