was a Japanese spree killer and

novelist A novelist is an author or writer of novels, though often novelists also write in other genres of both fiction and non-fiction. Some novelists are professional novelists, thus make a living wage, living writing novels and other fiction, while othe ...

Biography

Nagayama was born in Abashiri,

Hokkaido is Japan, Japan's Japanese archipelago, second largest island and comprises the largest and northernmost Prefectures of Japan, prefecture, making up its own List of regions of Japan, region. The Tsugaru Strait separates Hokkaidō from Honshu; th ...

and grew up with divorced parents. He moved to

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...

in 1965 and, while working in Tokyo's Shibuya district, witnessed the Zama and Shibuya shootings. Nagayama killed four people with a handgun between October11 and November5, 1968. He robbed the last two victims of 16,420yen. He was arrested on April7, 1969. When he was arrested, he was 19years old and was regarded as a minor under Japanese law at the time. The Tokyo District Court sentenced him to death in 1979, though this was overturned by the Tokyo High Court, which imposed a sentence of

life imprisonment Life imprisonment is any sentence (law), sentence of imprisonment for a crime under which convicted people are to remain in prison for the rest of their natural lives or indefinitely until pardoned, paroled, or otherwise commuted to a fixed te ...

in 1981. The

Supreme Court of Japan The , located in Hayabusachō, Chiyoda, Tokyo, is the highest court in Japan. It has ultimate judicial authority to interpret the Japanese constitution and decide questions of national law. It has the power of judicial review, which allows it ...

reversed the high court's decision in 1983. This ruling is today considered the landmark decision for the application of the death penalty in Japan. The high court on remand subsequently sentenced him to death in 1987, a decision which the Supreme Court upheld in 1990. In

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, Nagayama wrote many novels and became a public figure. His first published work was in 1971. In 1983, he was awarded a prize for the novel . The Japanese writing community was uneasy with his success, given his status as a convicted killer. He was rejected by the Japan Writers' Association but did receive recognition in

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, Germany in 1996. On August1, 1997, he was executed at the Tokyo Detention Center at the age of 48 by decision of Justice Minister Isao Matsuura, just 34days after the arrest of Seito Sakakibara, the 14-year-old perpetrator of the Kobe child murders. He made no final statement. A foundation to save poor people was established by his will.

Victims

#Masanori Nakamura (中村公紀, ''Nakamura Masanori'') #Tomejirō Katsumi (勝見留次郎, ''Katsumi Tomejirō'') #Tetsuhiko Saitō (斎藤哲彦, ''Saitō Tetsuhiko'') #Masaaki Itō (伊藤正明, ''Itō Masaaki'')

Works

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References

External links

In Secrecy, Japan Hangs a Best-Selling Author, a Killer of 4
''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', August 7, 1997
10 years after hanging, killer still offers lessons to be learned
''

The Japan Times ''The Japan Times'' is Japan's largest and oldest English-language daily newspaper. It is published by , a subsidiary of News2u Holdings, Inc.. It is headquartered in the in Kioicho, Chiyoda, Tokyo. History ''The Japan Times'' was launched b ...

'', August 1, 2007
Norio NagayamaA.K.A Serial Killer
accessed July 17, 2017. {{DEFAULTSORT:Nagayama, Norio 1949 births 1997 deaths 20th-century Japanese novelists People from Hokkaido People executed by Japan by hanging 20th-century executions by Japan Executed Japanese people Japanese people convicted of murder People convicted of murder by Japan Executed spree killers 1968 murders in Japan People executed for murder

Biography

Victims

Works

See also

References

External links