EXCLUSIVE: Police attacker sought info on ex-colleagues of baseball team

June 18, 2019

Osaka--The arrested suspect in Sunday's attack on a policeman in Suita, Osaka Prefecture, western Japan, had recently approached former junior high school baseball teammates to find out their home addresses and other information, as well as a photograph of the team's coach, Jiji Press learned on Monday.

The suspect, Yujiro Iimori, 33, told his former teammates that he was collecting information as he hoped to organize a reunion, according to informed sources.

Iimori belonged to a local baseball team when he was at elementary school in Suita and to a baseball club at his junior high school in the city, the sources said. He went to college in Tokyo later.

A 33-year-old former teammate said he received a message from Iimori on Facebook six days before he attacked a policeman at a police box in the city and took the officer's gun early in the morning on Sunday.

In the message, Iimori asked the former colleague to send the full names of then members of the school baseball team and a photo of the coach.

The former colleague did not respond to the message as he had not seen Iimori since they left junior high school.

The former teammate said his younger brother received a phone call from Iimori.

The Osaka prefectural police found Iimori hiding in the mountains in the city of Minoo, north of Suita, early on Monday morning, and arrested him on charges of attempted murder and robbery.

He appeared to have fired the gun he took from the officer, Suzunosuke Kose, 26, who is still unconscious after being stabbed in the chest. Jiji Press