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Gunman (Possibly a Foreigner) Attacks Sasebo Sports Club

A man burst into a sports club in Sasebo tonight, gunning down several people before fleeing the scene. Several Japanese news sources, including Mainichi, are reporting that the gunman may be a foreigner:

SASEBO, Nagasaki — At least one person died and several others were injured after a gunman opened fire at a sports club here Friday, police and other sources said.

An emergency phone call was received from the Renaissance Sasebo sports club in the city at 7:13 p.m. Friday, reporting a noise like an explosion. A subsequent report said it appeared that a rifle had been fired.

When officials arrived at the scene, they found a woman collapsed at the scene. She was taken to a hospital but was confirmed dead. The woman was subsequently identified as Mai Kuramoto, 26, a worker at the club. Reports said she had died almost instantly after being shot.

[...]

Sasebo Police Station officials said the shooter was between 170 and 180 centimeters tall, and was wearing a full-faced helmet and a silver-gray jacket. Reports said that he fled the scene on foot.

Sources at the sports club said that recently Kuramoto had been stalked by a foreigner.

It’s too early to know what exactly happened, but a shooting incident in an area with a US military base, a victim said to have been stalked by a foreigner, and a masked suspect taller than most Japanese seemingly lead to the possibility of a foreign gunman….

Update: The media is now reporting that the gunman has been identified as a 37 year-old Japanese man who had had used the sports club before. He was found several kilometers from the crime scene, dead of an apparent suicide. The shotgun used in the attack was one of three he had legally registered.

Hats off to those news organizations such as N-H-K who did not jump the gun on reporting the suspect’s race.

43 comments - What do you think? Posted by James - December 14, 2007 at 11:24 pm

Categories: Foreigners in Japan Tags: japan, navy, news, sasebo, shooting

Kevin

I’ve been following this story all night (what can I say, it’s Friday), and on the 11pm news on channel 12 they had a report from the police that said the shooter’s face was ‘dark’ and that the shooter’s height was from 170-190cm. The report also said that while the shooter has been reported as being a foreigner they were still investigating and had no proof either way.
Based on this news, I’m getting the feeling that the rush to say the shooter is a foreigner might be complicating the investigation.
Just for the record too, even though I hate their mandatory billing practices, NHK never once mentioned the shooter’s race.

http://www.japanprobe.com James

The use of a longer rifle or shotgun might be a mark against the American military guy theory, since such long-barreled weapons can be legally owned by Japanese. [However it is still too early to know what's has happened.]

Kevin

He he, I was just going to post a follow-up about the gun. I keep hearing ライフル (rifle) and 散弾銃 (shotgun) on all the channels but based on the descriptions by witnesses, it sure sounds like a shotgun to me.
I suppose the American military is a possibility but the whole thing smells like organized crime to me. Are the military allowed to bring personal weapons into the country? Does anyone know if shotguns are part of normal military weaponry?
My biggest annoyance with this whole event is how the news stations keep using 外国人風 (like a foreigner). Does this mean he was like a foreigner because he had a gun? Or because he was wearing baggy pants? Because his skin was a different color? Whether or not it was actually a NJ, the damage has been done; stereotypes reinforced.

http://beautifuljapan.org/ John

How did the guy get away? Did the police not arrive until he escaped?

http://lostinube.blogspot.com/ lost in ube

Looks like a second person (probably the man in his 30s who was reported as being in critical condition) has died.

NHK covered the story for like an hour as a part of their regular news so most of it was being translated as it was going on. The “dark” face comment may have come from earlier stories where the shooter was reported to have been wearing a helmet with a mask or possibly a ski mask. I didn’t see any stories that said that anyone had seen his face.

The hospital held a press conference. What they said was something along the lines of “we found some bullets that are like those from a shotgun so we presume that these people were shot with a shotgun.” A shotgun would explain how a number of different people were hit, some of them in the legs.
131172

I think the main factor to suspect the gunner as a foreigner is that the deceased lady was stalked by a foreigner according to sources from the club.

Anyway, two kids aged 9 and 10 are among the injured.
http://lostinube.blogspot.com/ lost in ube

Btw, he didn’t leave immediately after the shooting(s). I think they said that he was holed up inside the gym but then ran away or something like that.

Also, one of the NHK announcers was talking about the incident, saying something to the effect of this is something that happens in the US (the Utah mall shooting comes to mind) but it’s so very shocking that it happened in Japan.

Kevin

I was talking about this very subject with my wife tonight.

I’m from the US and there are so many shootings recently that it has zero effect on me when I hear of a new incident over there. I mean, as sad as this sounds, when I heard of the Virginia Tech shooting and the more recent mall shooting in Omaha, my first thought was – sheesh, another one.

However, I found this shooting pretty surprising and I was astonished when the governor of Nagasaki was murdered.

131172

Other news sources that I read mentions the possibility of underground groups conflicts and more interestingly that the gunner was wearing a camouflage suit.

I think because of Japan tight guns control, firearms related incidents often linked to uderground groups who have access to firearms instead of normanl citizens.
andoroido

Hard to make a call, because claimng it couldn’t be a gaijin is almost as racist as the anonymous (by Japanese) claims that somehow, someway, certain oyaji witnesses could tell that someone in a helmet and/or facemask and camouflage was a gaijin.

Hard to make any sense of motive, but the probability that it was a shotgun does lean things toward it being a Japanese person. Shotguns/rifles are perfectly legal for “sport” or “hunting” purposes in Japan, with the proper paperwork.
Add in that (I think) you can’t match up shotgun pellets with a particular gun like you could a bullet. (and the Japanese police probably couldn’t even match up a bullet)

One would think that a US military shooter would use typical GI weapons, M4, M16, or an M9 pistol, BUT, the very knowledge that such a weapon would make him stand out as a US soldier…. ah, you could go in circles on that logic.

BTW, I think Japanese men trump almost any other nationality when it comes to stalking.

We can be sure that the hours of press coverage from now on will exponentially increase if it turns out to be a foreigner.
Sasebo-American

I would just like to say that I am an American living in Sasebo Japan so lets clear the air a bit here…. All military Americans are not allowed to own personal guns in Japan. Period. Now, they may have an issued gun for their job, but I find it very doubtful that the gun man would use a military weapon.

Now on to some of the other subjects, like racism in Japan. WOW, you really hit the nail on the head with that one. I personally think that Japanese people are the most racist people I have ever met. They seem to always point the finger at a “foreigner” when something really bad happens here. And I would say 95% of the time it isn’t the “foreigner” but one of their own people. I mean why would the “Perfect Race” kill one of their own? So they continue to point the finger at the Americans.

Yes the Yakuza is a big problem here. Underground mafia. Well I wouldn’t even say they are underground… they are out in the open and don’t care who knows who they are. Think 1920′s gangsters, finely dressed men who drive very expensive cars. With the major “turf wars” lately I can only speculate that this too could be part of it.

Kevin

Believing stereotypes or having prejudice is not a form of racism. It’s when laws or policies are created in response to a stereotype or prejudice that it becomes racism. You should think of racism as the extreme end of prejudice and while it’s easy to throw out the word it’s also not very practical.
Just to clarify, if a Japanese person finds out you’re American and says you’re probably carrying a gun and you’re dangerous, that’s prejudice (a stereotype). If they say you can’t eat in their establishment because you are American (i.e. you’re dangerous), that’s racism.

Chamel

That`s a lawyer like opinion.But any person has his own fabricated steoreotype or prejudice,everyone is free to do that;but when you let those stereotype or prejudice interfere with your relationship with another human being that`s racism.

Kevin

I’m curious how you define “interfere with you relationship with another human being”.
Chamel

When I use that phrase I was thinking that a normal relationship means respect for the feelings,credos,rigths,freedom of the another side so I can get in response the same.Maybe my definition is too ample and fits better with “Discrimination”,but if we are talking about race or color discrimination I thinks it`s proper.

another american

Gee you think the Japanese are the most racist people you have ever met. I guess your not brown with a spanish accent or a middle eastern type from America. Have you read the reports from Russia about racism ,how about the French of East African decent in France(clue:riots). Hell the rise of racism in Europe(clue:neo-nazism).
I’m a 4th gen Japanese American my parents were born in the relocation camps, my dad had some interesting experiences in the south when he was drafted into the Army to go to Vietnam. Lived though the LA riots in 1992 caused by racism and stereotypes ,I knew at least one person that died in Long Beach(wasn’t good). Maybe you never felt uncomfortable driving through parts of Orange County in the 80′s and 90′s being young and asian since the cops were profiling for asian gangmembers.
I’m sorry but you sound young white and have not well traveled and/or up on world news, would that be a stereotypical assumption or an accurate guess.
I met an interesting Gentle man, he was black and had lived though and wrote about the racism and unrest in the South and what he said its can be just as bad for both sides to cast generalizations about the other.
btw did you know there was a yellow power movement around the sametime as the blackpower movement live and learn huh?

http://beautifuljapan.org/ John

Reporting now on breaking TV news that a 37-year-old suspect has been found dead, apparently a suicide, in Sasebo. No name or other info, but it seems the person must have been identified.
Dan Murray

He’s Japanese. Wonder if he’ll turn out to have been anywhere near 190cm tall…..
http://beautifuljapan.org/ John

On Fuji Terebi just now, the reporter was holding up a printd sign with details about the criminal (Magome Masayoshi) and next to his name, they’d handwritten with a marker “(日本人)”. Good for Fuji Terebi for emphasizing it was not a foreigner.
TheManiac

[Comment deleted by admin: Lay off the "a nation of racists" comments.]
http://myso-calledjapaneselife.blogspot.com/ Shari

Regarding Androido’s comment that claiming it couldn’t be a a foreigner is as racist as claiming it was a foreigner, in an absolute sense, that is true. However, there are a lot more Japanese people in Japan (by a huge factor) than foreign people. The likelihood that a foreign person has committed a crime is far lower than a Japanese person having done so because they are the vast majority. It’s statistics.

The main problem with a story like this is that the Japanese associate all crimes with foreigners and suspect them first and foremost. It doesn’t seem to matter how many murders are committed by Japanese people, foreigners seem to be suspected first unless there is a confession already on the record.

Japanese people can legally own rifles so any time someone is killed with a rifle, there’s a good chance the perpetrator was Japanese. I personally don’t believe the “stalked by a foreigner” part of the story at all. I think it was just some dumb thing someone said in the aftermath of a trauma as a means of grasping for an explanation.

ponta

When the U.S. media reported that there was an unconfirmed report that the shooter was of Asian ethnicity at Massacre at Virginia Tech University, did that mean Americans associate all crimes with Asian?

http://myso-calledjapaneselife.blogspot.com/ Shari

No, it means someone actually saw the shooter’s face and he looked Asian. In the case you’re talking about, the shooter’s appearance wasn’t obscured by a head covering. This meant a visual observation was possible.

In the Japanese case, the face was covered. In the absence of a visual observation, the highest possibility is a Japanese shooter (again, because there are more Japanese people in Japan relative tot he number of foreigners).

Are you saying that a helmeted individual whose face is covered somehow “looks foreign”?

ponta

Are you saying that a helmeted individual whose face is covered somehow “looks foreign”?”

Not at all.
There were sevceral reports on the media. Not all the media spoke of a foreinger. According to Mr.Arudo there are three media which mentioned a foreigner as a possible suspect.(That means there are a lot of other Japanese media which didn’t mention a foreinger)
Accordging to NTV, many people said he was dark, he was a black. Notice he was not seen covered with a helmet.
Sankei covered three specialists;one of them said it is possible that the shooter is a military man in Sasebo who was influenced by the massacare in the U.S. Keep in mind there was military base in Sasebo.
Sankei and Mainich also reported the vicitms was stalked by a foreinger. Note also it is not the man covered with a helmet.

I wonder how you came to coclusion, from these facts, that “Japanese associate all crimes with foreigners and suspect them first and foremost.”

Larry K.

“…did that mean Americans associate all crimes with Asian?”

No. witnesses had seen him and identified him as Asian. turned out to be correct too. However, if every time there was a crime in the US they started saying people of Asians ethnicity did it it would mean many Americans associated crime with people of Asian ethnicity. If many Americans started saying people of Asian ethnicity (Americans or not) were crime prone or terrorists prone it would also mean that. If magazine was openly published and sold by major publishers that said people of Asian ethnicity were likely criminals, it would probably mean that too.

If the governors of large cities in the US started claiming things like people of Asian ethnicity (American or not) are criminals, it would mean that. If the US government pushed the idea that people of Asian ethnicity—legal residents, American or not—were responsible for increasing crime even though it was not true, it would mean that.

Of course, since none of this is common or widespread in Japan, just because the media—who never would participate in accusing foreigners of being responsible for rising crime in Japan—innocently said the shooter may have been a foreigner, doesn’t mean that the remark was made out of prejudice. We have to assume purity of motive.

Unfortunately, we have people who have been in Japan too long and assume any unbiased remark about foreigns being involved in crime is discriminatory. It is strange how the longer people stay in Japan, the less they know. Even if it were true, other countries have problems with discrimination too.

another american

hahaha
Replace Asian with Middle Eastern, Hispanic, or “illegal immigrant” in your comment and maybe people will make the connection probably not. Boo hoo I’ve only been to Japan or Korea and never really traveled the world or studied recent world news on racism, you know people are dying from racism in counties like England and Russia and you are whining about this. Wait how about people crying out for you to be killed because you let kids name a teddy bear mohammad or just because you believe in another religion or worship the same god differently.
http://myso-calledjapaneselife.blogspot.com/ Shari

If you’ve been here long enough, Larry K., you’ve heard a lot of Japanese people say that the reason the answer to Japan’s shrinking population problem isn’t immigration is that more foreigners will increase the crime rate.

I think the more you are here, the more you know because, if you talk to people, the bias reveals itself slowly. Japanese people don’t express their opinions easily and you’ve got to ask questions which aren’t blatantly designed to reveal prejudice, but the prejudice is there, particularly against other Asians. The media is a part of perpetuating the pre-conceived notions Japanese people have about foreigners, and that includes making unsubstantiated reports about the identity of criminals without a second thought.

Other countries have problems, too, but that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t discuss a Japanese news story on Japan Probe, nor that Japan is exempt from scrutiny. Not every discussion of a Japanese news story on a Japanese news-based web site has to turn into a discussion of every other country’s problems (which are really beside the point).

ponta

A friend of mine said the same thing about Americans.
She said the more you were there in the U.S. the more you knew white Americans have prejudice against the colored. That might be true. But everyone has prejudice, that does not mean they associate every crimes with the colored not does it mean that Japanese associate every crime with a foreigners first and foremost.
Sure Japanese are not exempt from scrutiny, but that does not mean any allegation about them should be accepted. In fact ungrounded accusation is just another prejudice against Japanese.

marinaliteyears

You’re exactly right Shari…Colored? Colored is such an old word ,I would use black or african americans.
ponta

I used the word “the colored” meaning 有色人種 including Asian and African descendants.
The Overthinker

And yet, since white is what happens when you mix all the colours of the spectrum, shouldn’t white people be the *most* coloured….?
ponta

No, because white people are not the result of mixed spectrum, and the people do not use the word that way. (It seems it is not used now anyway,though)
The Overthinker

You’re taking me waaaay too seriously here.
ponta

I know but my joke does not work in English so I have no other way other than speak seriously.

L

The Japanese internet users are blaming the Koreans.
They say he’s a Korean ethnic. With what evidence they’re so sure that it’s a Korean, I don’t know. Anybody know?

Kevin

If by Japanese internet users you’re referring to 2chan or the message boards on yahoo, then you should probably just ignore them. Those two places have become extremely and openly hateful places where horrible comments about Koreans are the norm.
One of their biggest pieces of “evidence” was that the shooter’s name sounded Korean – 馬込 (magome) even though when I asked other Japanese people they told me this wasn’t true.
When I was perusing the the boards on the night of the incident, there were just as many people saying it was a black person (using the N word do describe him) and that he should be shot. When it came out that the shooter was Japanese they just moved to the next explanation they could come up with.
In other words, the online communities of Japan should be taken with a grain of salt the size of the moon.

doinkies

Yeah. A lot of the people who post at those boards are doinks – of course there are some who aren’t doinks, but unfortunately it seems that the hateful doinks are the loudest, drowning out everyone else. A lot of them say such things to get attention, because they feel they are safe because they’re anonymous. And especially on 2ch many of the doinks post over and over again but you can’t tell (because again, 2ch is anonymous).

It is just like the old American Yahoo! boards, in terms of doinky posts. I’m not surprised that Yahoo! Japan’s boards have doinks too.

steve dowripple

yeah i agree
kazuki

I am a Japanese.
My English is poor but,please listen.
I can’t believe that this was caused by Japanese yet.
(I don’t mean foreigners might do. )
You know,Japan is very safe country.
And we think all Japanese people are innocent.
Generally speaking,Japanese people had never seen something like shotgun or rifle.
We think they have something to do with illegal matter,so we never dream of gun possession of innocent Japanese people.

rei

This crime was committed by a Japanese person.

The accident where a little boy shot his brother a few days ago was caused by a Japanese.

The crime a few months ago in Machida where a man shot a gangster was committed by a Japanese.

The mayor of Nagasaki was shot and killed, by a Japanese.

…
Aki

I am a Japanese too. I think 99.999% of adult Japanese who can either read newspapers or watch TV do not share your view, if you meant what you wrote.
ponta

I am Japanese too. I thought the shooter was a Japanese who had something to do with the woman shot. It seems I was right.
If you don’t know a murder by a Japanese guy with rifle, you might want to google Tatoo あり　
Japan is a safe place for sure but there are plenty of crazy guys too.

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Gunman (Possibly a Foreigner) Attacks Sasebo Sports Club

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