Yukio Yamaji


Yukio Yamaji was a Japanese serial killer. He murdered his own mother in 2000, was imprisoned, and then paroled in 2003. In 2005, two years after his release, he raped and then murdered a 27-year-old woman and her 19-year-old sister. He was executed by hanging in 2009.

Biography

Yamaji was born into a poor family. His father died of cirrhosis in January 1995. After graduating from junior high school, he dropped out and began working at a newspaper store.

Matricide

Yamaji killed his 50-year-old mother with a metal baseball bat in Yamaguchi city, Yamaguchi Prefecture at age 16 on July 29, 2000. He called the police and was arrested on July 31, 2000. He stated that his motives to commit matricide were his mother's silent telephone calls to the woman with whom he fell in love and his mother's mounting debt. He was paroled in October 2003.

Double homicide

On November 17, 2005, Yamaji raped and murdered a 27-year-old woman and her 19-year-old sister with a knife, in Naniwa, Osaka. He then set fire to their apartment and fled. The two victims had never met Yamaji before. He was arrested on December 5, 2005. While in custody, he stated to the Osaka police, "I could not forget the feeling when I killed my mother, and wanted to see human blood."

Sentence

On December 13, 2006, the Osaka District Court sentenced him to death. His defense made an appeal, but according to his lawyers he retracted it because he was "reluctant to pursue leniency." He was executed by hanging alongside Japanese serial killer Hiroshi Maeue in Osaka on July 28, 2009. At the age of 25, he is the youngest murderer executed in Japan since 1972.