Akihabara marks 1st anniversary of deadly stabbing rampage

TOKYO, June 8 Kyodo - Tokyo's Akihabara district, a popular electronics area which attracts both
Japanese and foreign comic and animation fans, marked the first anniversary
Monday of a stabbing rampage in which seven people were killed and 10 others
were injured.
Tomohiro Kato, a 26-year-old former temporary worker, has been charged with
running down pedestrians with a truck in a vehicle-free shopping area on the
afternoon of June 8 last year, a Sunday, and fatally stabbing passersby with a
dagger after getting out of the truck.
At a crossroads where the rampage took place, flower bouquets, paper cranes
folded for peace, and message cards were placed. One message said, ''Please
rest in peace,'' and some passersby offered prayers at the site.
Hiroshi Yuasa, 55, a taxi driver who was seriously injured in the incident,
visited the crossroads early Monday morning and laid flowers.
Yuasa said Kato should ''tell all (about the rampage) honestly'' in order for
the souls of the dead victims to find repose. The driver said he still suffers
from chest pains and headaches.
Kato, who was arrested immediately at the scene of the assault, was later
indicted on charges of murder and attempted murder. The Tokyo District Court is
scheduled to hold a session on June 22 to decide proceedings for his trial.
The accused, who had served as a temporary staffer at an auto assembly factory
in Susono, Shizuoka Prefecture, is known to have posted a series of messages on
a mobile phone bulletin board warning about the deadly rampage in advance.
Naoya Sugino, a 30-year-old game maker who was in Akihabara on the day of the
killing spree, said he feels he could easily have become a victim of the
rampage himself. ''Why did such an incident happen? I still cannot figure it
out,'' he said while offering a prayer.
The Akihabara stabbing spree took place on the seventh anniversary of a killing
spree by a man at Ikeda Elementary School in Osaka Prefecture affiliated with
the state-run Osaka Kyoiku University on June 8, 2001.
The attacker, Mamoru Takuma, was executed in 2004 for stabbing to death eight
children and injuring 15 others in that case.
On Monday, about 700 people including bereaved families attended a memorial
ceremony held at the elementary school to mark the eighth anniversary of the
incident.
A six-grader pledged at the ceremony to make the elementary school ''a
wonderful place full of laughter.'' Almost all the pupils and teachers who
experienced the spree at first hand have graduated or left the school.
Following the incident, the elementary school was renovated to prevent entry by
strangers. It now has security surveillance cameras and alarms.
Ikeda teachers also began offering classes from this spring focused on safety
promotion to teach pupils how to protect themselves against strangers and
traffic accidents.
The teachers observed classes given by schools in South Korea and Taiwan, which
have been designated as ''international safe schools.''
Those schools have been recognized by the World Health Organization as they
meet certain criteria such as having an infrastructure based on partnership and
collaborations among teachers, pupils, parents and technical staff responsible
for safety promotion in their schools.
==Kyodo