Families of ‘Sagamihara Stabbings’ victims angered by retrial request by convicted killer

By Barrier Free Japan with extracts from The Kanagawa Shimbun via MSN

April 30 2022

YOKOHAMA – “I was forced to swing the hands of the clock back. Are you still swinging?” The family members of the victims of the Sagamihara Stabbings are upset over the fact that the former employee, Satoshi Uematsu, a 32-year-old prisoner who had been sentenced to death in the trial of the Tsukui Yamayurien case and withdrew his appeal, filed a retrial request with the Yokohama District Court.

“It would be very disappointing if the request for retrial was true. What makes me even more annoyed now?”

Miho, who lost her life in the incident, her mother and her brother at that time (19) commented through a lawyer on April 29th. Before the lay judge trial in 2020, her mother announced her real name, “Miho lived hard. She wants to leave a testimony.” She asked Uematsu to be sentenced death in court directly, “I want you to be sentenced to death.”

Miho’s mother visited the completed ‘Requiem Monument’ in the garden on the anniversary on March 26th this year, and she said, “I wonder if there was a break here and her shoulders were unloaded, ” she said.

Takeshi Ono (78), whose son Kazuya (49) was seriously injured in the incident, said, “I am surprised and have no words. I expressed my anger.”