Tokyo woman stabbed more than 30 times during live stream

TOKYO — The young woman who was fatally attacked while live streaming on a street in downtown Tokyo was stabbed more than 30 times, according to the police on Wednesday, indicating that the alleged attacker had a deep-seated grudge against her.

The suspect, Kenichi Takano, 42, told the police that he had exhausted his savings and borrowed money to lend millions of yen to the woman. They were apparently caught up in a financial argument.

The 22-year-old victim, Airi Sato, was ambushed by Takano on a residential street in Shinjuku, one of Tokyo’s busiest wards, early on Tuesday morning, police said. She suffered injuries to her neck and chest.

Takano told police he bought the survival knife, which he had used in the attack, by mail order two to three months ago, and brought it from his home in Oyama, Tochigi prefecture, to the Takadanobaba district.

(He reportedly told the police that he tracked down her whereabouts by watching her stream before Tuesday.) He has told police that he was “unable to accept” that she was “making money from streaming while owing me money.”

Takano was introduced to Sato by her streams in February 2021, police said. He started showing up often at an eatery where she worked around August 2022 and eventually started giving her money because she said she was having trouble paying for living expenses.

Takano filed a lawsuit against Sato in 2023 over the reimbursement of these funds, with case records showing that he claimed she had borrowed a total of some ¥2.54 million (US$17,000) over 10 occasions from September to November 2022. The ruling also ordered her to pay ¥2.5 million to Takano.

But in January 2024, however, he approached police in Tochigi prefecture, telling them that Sato had disappeared in the wake of the ruling, the source close to the man said.