Police arrested the 27-year-old resident of the apartment in Zama, Kanagawa Prefecture, saying he had admitted killing the woman soon after they first met. Takahiro Shiraishi and the woman may have became acquainted on an internet site for people who want to commit suicide, the police added.

According to investigative sources, Shiraishi has also told the police that he killed all of the nine since he moved into the apartment in late August.

He also said stealing money was also behind the killings.

The body parts, found inside cold-storage containers and tool boxes, apparently belonged to eight women and one man. The bodies displayed multiple cuts and some of the body parts had already been reduced to bone, according to the police.

Shiraishi was arrested on suspicion of mutilating one body of unknown identity, hiding it inside a cold-storage container and disposing of it between August and October. The police are expected to file murder charges later.

“I tried to hide the body of the person I killed,” Shiraishi was quoted as telling the police, referring to one of the bodies. “I dismembered it in the bathroom, disposing of some body parts in the garbage.”

A saw, believed to have been used to dismember the bodies, was also found in his apartment.

Shiraishi also said he did not discard the bodies in his apartment for fear the case could come to light, the police said.

The police conducted the search after security camera footage showed Shiraishi walking with the woman, who had been missing from her home in Hachioji in the western suburbs of Tokyo since late October, near JR Hachioji Station and near the Odakyu Line’s Sobudaimae Station near his home on Oct 23.

A message was posted on the woman’s Twitter account on Sept 20 saying she was “looking for someone who will die with me.” The message said she “wants to die, but is scared of dying alone.”

Her brother contacted the police on Oct 24 saying she had been missing since Oct 21. The brother later used her Twitter account password and found that she had been exchanging messages with Shiraishi, investigative sources said.

Shiraishi’s neighbors expressed shock and disbelief at the news that nine bodies had been discovered in his apartment. One neighbor described the suspect as “a cheerful, kind and polite man. I cannot believe this.”

A resident living on the same floor of Shiraishi’s apartment building noticed a foul smell coming from his room from around August. “It was a kind of smell I have never smelled before. I thought it was sewage,” he said.

According to residents who know him, Shiraishi was sometimes seen visiting his family home where his father lived alone, after his mother and younger sister had left several years before.

A young man who recently moved near the Shiraishi family home said he saw Shiraishi several times late at night during the past few months.

“He was sitting in front of the door and looking at his cell phone. It felt creepy,” he said.

Source:japantoday.com