Overview
- Sasaki Yoshishi, 49, received three years in prison with a five-year suspension from the Sendai District Court on Tuesday, short of the six years prosecutors sought.
- The ruling says he stabbed his son in the back several times as the boy slept in their Ishinomaki home in April 2025 and then strangled him with a rope and his hands.
- Judge Takashi Sakakibara found he had developed depression after a divorce as he struggled to prepare meals for his son and deemed him of diminished responsibility under Penal Code Article 39(2), which allows a lighter sentence when mental illness weakens judgment.
- The judge condemned the killing of a trusted 15-year-old and urged the father to keep facing his son's death, noting the sentence came on the first anniversary of the boy's death.
- In other reports Tuesday, Tokyo police opened an inquiry after a woman said she attempted a double suicide that left her grade-school daughter dead, and a separate feature described a Kumamoto mother using social media to pursue teens she says beat her son, highlighting family strain and shaken trust in authorities.