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7 Killed in Tokyo Gadget District, Killer Plotted Actions Online

by Tim Stevens on June 9, 2008 at 05:19 PM

Seven Dead in Akihabara RampageAkihabara, a district in Tokyo, Japan, is known world-wide as the place to go for gadgets. Nowhere else on the planet offers the same access (or as many stores) to the latest (and weirdest) in technology, resulting in the place being a mob of shoppers at any given time. Sadly, over the weekend, it also turned into the scene of a horrible tragedy, with one man mowing down a group of pedestrians in a rented truck before jumping out and attacking anyone nearby with a knife, ultimately killing seven before he was subdued by police.

Tomohiro Kato was the man behind the attack, and he plotted his actions online before leaving to do the deed. He made numerous posts to a Japanese messageboard, saying things like "I'm going to Akihabara to kill people. If my car is destroyed I'll use a knife."

Seven hours later he would do exactly that, leaving another 10 hospitalized. Could someone have done something to prevent this after his initial warnings? In the sea of posts created by users of all sorts online, it appears that any sort of prevention would have been unlikely. [Source: PCWorld, via Boing Boing Gadgets]

Tags: akihabara, breaking news, BreakingNews, crime, massacre

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