JAPAN POLICE DETAIN 86-YEAR-OLD SUSPECTED GUNMAN WHO

HAD BARRICADED HIMSELF IN POST OFFICE WITH HOSTAGES

By Akanksha Sharma, Junko Ogura and Mayumi Maruyama, CNN

Japanese police on Tuesday arrested an 86-year-old suspected gunman who had

barricaded himself in a post office with two hostages after injuring two people at a hospital
earlier in the day. The man was detained in the city of Warabi, Saitama prefecture, near Tokyo,
police told CNN, following an hours-long standoff.
Tokyo’s Metropolitan Police Department had dispatched its Special Investigation
Teams, which handles hostage situations, to the post office Tuesday afternoon local time after
reports the suspect had holed himself up there and authorities were unable to contact two female
post office workers.
According to public broadcaster NHK, neither women was harmed in the incident. One
woman walked out of the post office about five hours after the incident began, and the other
escaped several hours later, NHK reported.
Police confirmed to CNN that a woman in her 20s who was being held hostage was
now safe. The hostage situation and stand off at the post office came just hours after a shooting
at a hospital in nearby Toda city that injured a doctor and a male patient.
Police believe the 86-year-old was involved in that earlier incident. Police said the
shooting occurred at 1 p.m. local time, and the suspect fled the hospital before barricading
himself in the post office, about 1.5 kilometers (1 mile) away. Toda Mayor Fumihito Sugawara
confirmed on social media that a man “suspected of carrying a gun” was barricaded in at the
post office and warned residents not to go near the area.
Earlier Tuesday, there was a fire in an apartment building not far from the hospital.
Investigators believe the gunman lived in one of the apartment units, according to NHK. No
one was hurt in the blaze, NHK reported.
Gun violence is extremely rare in Japan. The country has one of the world’s lowest
rates of gun crime due to its strict laws on firearms ownership. Last year, former Japanese
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was shot dead in Nara city while delivering a campaign speech, in
an attack that shocked the nation. This is a developing story and will be updated.