Japanese Family Murdered by Assailants... Suspects Found to Be 16-Year-Old High School Students

Suspected of Involvement in "Yami Baito"

It has been revealed that the group responsible for killing three members of a family in Japan included perpetrators as young as 16-year-old high school students, shocking the public. Local police believe that they were involved in 'Yami Baito' (dark part-time jobs), a type of youth-organized crime that has been increasing recently in Japan.

According to Japanese media reports including NHK and TV Asahi on the 17th (local time), an incident occurred on the 14th in a house in Tochigi Prefecture, where several assailants broke in. They killed a 69-year-old woman and injured her two sons.

A house in Tochigi Prefecture where a robbery-murder incident occurred. Photo by NHK

Based on evidence such as CCTV footage, police tracked and arrested two 16-year-old high school students, referred to as Student A and Student B. By the 16th, they had also arrested Student C, an acquaintance of Student B, and then arrested a fourth suspect, Student D. The relationship between Student D and the other three has not yet been clarified, but all four are 16-year-old youths living in Kanagawa Prefecture.

During police questioning, Student A reportedly stated, "A person in the same grade was an accomplice," and, "I joined the group after being invited." Local police believe that all four were recruited through Yami Baito and are investigating those who orchestrated the scheme.

Yami Baito refers to a crime structure in which a mastermind recruits so-called "runners" through social networking services (SNS), giving them specific instructions to commit offenses. These runners are often teenagers or young people in their early twenties in need of money, who are then contracted for violent crimes such as robbery and murder. Because these jobs are solicited and paid for online, resembling part-time work, they are referred to as "Yami Baito" or "dark part-time jobs."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.