Hiroyasu Koga ( ''Koga Hiroyasu'', born 15 August 1947) is a former

Tatenokai The or Shield Society was a private militia in Japan dedicated to traditional Japanese values and veneration of the Emperor. It was founded and led by author Yukio Mishima. Background The Tatenokai was created on October 5, 1968, recruiting ...

member and

kaishakunin A ''kaishakunin'' ( ja, 介錯人) is a person appointed to behead an individual who has performed seppuku, Japanese ritual suicide, at the moment of agony. The role played by the ''kaishakunin'' is called ''kaishaku''. Aside from being spared p ...

responsible for the

decapitation Decapitation or beheading is the total separation of the head from the body. Such an injury is invariably fatal to humans and most other animals, since it deprives the brain of oxygenated blood, while all other organs are deprived of the i ...

s of

Yukio Mishima , born , was a Japanese author, poet, playwright, actor, model, Shintoist, Nationalism, nationalist, and founder of the , an unarmed civilian militia. Mishima is considered one of the most important Japanese authors of the 20th century. He was ...

and

Masakatsu Morita was a Japanese political activist who committed ''seppuku'' with Yukio Mishima in Tokyo. Morita was the youngest child of the headmaster of an elementary school. Losing both parents at the age of three, Morita was cared for by his brother Osamu ...

during their ''

seppuku , sometimes referred to as hara-kiri (, , a native Japanese kun reading), is a form of Japanese ritual suicide by disembowelment. It was originally reserved for samurai in their code of honour but was also practised by other Japanese people ...

'' on November 25, 1970. He studied

law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vario ...

Kanagawa University , abbreviated to is a private university in Japan. The main campus is located in Rokkakubashi, Kanagawa-ku, Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture. History The university was founded in 1928 by as . It was an evening school for the working youth. In 1 ...

and intended to become a lawyer. Koga, known by the nickname Furu-Koga (distinguishing him from another Tatenokai member named Masayoshi Koga who was in turn nicknamed Chibi-Koga, ), was a skilled practitioner of

kendo is a modern Japanese martial art, descended from kenjutsu (one of the old Japanese martial arts, swordsmanship), that uses bamboo swords (shinai) as well as protective armor (bōgu). Today, it is widely practiced within Japan and has spread ...

(swordsmanship). It was originally planned that Mishima would be decapitated by

, the Tatenokai's student leader; however, Morita was not trained in the sword and failed, at which point Koga stepped in to complete it. Koga then decapitated Morita as part of Morita's own ''seppuku''. Koga and two other participating Tatenokai members (Masayoshi Koga and Masahiro Ogawa) went on trial on March 24, 1971, facing charges of bodily injury, violence, illegal possession of firearms and swords, and assisting a suicide. They were convicted and sentenced to four years' penal servitude, and were released in 1974, a few months early. As of 2005, it was believed that he was a practising

Shinto Shinto () is a religion from Japan. Classified as an East Asian religion by scholars of religion, its practitioners often regard it as Japan's indigenous religion and as a nature religion. Scholars sometimes call its practitioners ''Shintois ...

priest at a shrine on

Shikoku is the smallest of the four main islands of Japan. It is long and between wide. It has a population of 3.8 million (, 3.1%). It is south of Honshu and northeast of Kyushu. Shikoku's ancient names include ''Iyo-no-futana-shima'' (), '' ...

. However, an alternative belief is that he never became a Shinto priest, instead becoming the head of the Hokkaido branch of Seicho no Ie and was renamed Hiroyasu Arechi. It is further posited that he now resides in

Kumamoto is the capital city of Kumamoto Prefecture on the island of Kyushu, Japan. , the city has an estimated population of 738,907 and a population density of 1,893 people per km2. The total area is 390.32 km2. had a population of 1,461,000, ...

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Koga, Hiroyasu Living people Japanese Shintoists Kanagawa University alumni Yukio Mishima 1947 births Decapitation Executioners Japanese kendoka