Japan yesterday hanged a Chinese man convicted of the murder of a family of four, whose bodies were found handcuffed and weighted down with dumbbells in a bay, Japanese Minister of Justice Masako Mori said.
Mori said that she ordered the execution of Wei Wei (魏巍) “after careful consideration” over a robbery and multiple murders carried out with two other students in 2003.
“It is an extremely cruel and brutal case in which the happily living family members, including an eight-year-old and 11-year-old, were all murdered because of truly selfish reasons,” she said.
Photo: AFP
Wei, a 40-year-old former language student in Japan, had pleaded guilty to the four murder counts, but contended that he was not the central figure in the case.
The trio, reportedly allured by money, robbed the home of Japanese businessman Shinjiro Matsumoto, 41, in the southwestern city of Fukuoka in June 2003 and strangled him with a tie.
His 40-year-old wife, Chika, was drowned in a bathtub, and the children were strangled or smothered.
The victims’ bodies were found dumped in Hakata Bay in Fukuoka, handcuffed and weighted down.
The other two suspects fled to China, but were arrested there.
According to Jiji Press, one of the two was executed in 2005, the year a Chinese court gave him a death sentence and his associate a life sentence.
According to the Asahi Shimbun, the first execution of a foreigner since the ministry began announcing the names of those executed was in 2009.
A Chinese man was hanged for killing three Chinese that he lived with near Tokyo and for injuring three, the Asahi Shimbun said.
Japan last executed inmates in August, when two men were hanged after being convicted of murder.
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