⛩️ #28 Rogue Kyoto Cop's Murder Rampage
SPECIAL EDITION: Your new favorite true crime
Masaharu Hirota was a sergeant in the Kyoto Police when he stole a colleague’s gun and robbed a post office — but that was just the beginning of a crime spree which left 2 people dead…
That’s all we’ve got for you this week and it’s a doozy.
Let’s dive into it:
THE HISTORY
Rogue Kyoto Cop’s Murder Rampage
Yūya Uchida as the bad cop in The Mosquito in the 10th Floor, a movie based upon the case. Image: IMDB
You’re a 32 year-old man, assistant managering a Kyoto bank
You’re on your pride and joy, which is a motorbike you saved for years to buy. It’s midday and you’re piddling through central Kyoto, known as the Goban no mé, from the resemblance of its narrow, gridlike streets to the board used to play the ancient game of Go.
Suddenly a corner ahead releases a big man in a shabby suit. He’s got a face like an overweight lizard and a doodle of black hair hovering above his eyes.
He’s in the process of taking out something you’ve only seen in movies, which is a gun, then he unceremoniously fires off a shot directly at your nose.
It hits. You swerve, shimmy, almost keep the bike upright — then get thrown ass over teacups, describe an arc through the air, then hit the ground and roll. The motorbike skitters off belching sparks and ends up wrapped around an electricity pole.
You bounce up, bleeding adrenaline, realizing you’re alive — and that the shot actually hit the bike’s windshield and tangented off in the direction of Mars rather than your brain stem.
The fat man, the human slug who just tried to shoot you, is now hustling in your direction, looking more than capable of issuing a coup de grace. Fortunately you’re still in that dreamlike, ok-goody interval before whatever pain you’re destined for organizes itself and arrives, so you manage to limp-sprint off at a pace that leaves fatty cursing in your wake.
It’s 25 minutes later. You’re a 45 year old female post office clerk with zero clue what just happened to a motorcyclist a few miles away
Into your branch enters a fat man in a shabby suit. He got a fleshy face and a mop of greasy black hair.
He checks you’re alone, then pulls a foot of gun from his waistband. He thinks he’s holding the trump card and he wants to collect his winnings. He starts giving you vowel about empty the banknotes from the drawer, bitch.
You, however, have more kidney than the average citizen. You tell him not today. He doesn’t like that. He lays the butt of the pistol over your skull a couple times leaving a flap of your scalp hanging off — but when it’s clear you just won’t give it up, he quits the post office without getting a penny and is last seen pedaling furiously away on a bicycle.
The former Nishijin Police Station (now Kamigyōku Police Station). Image: Wikipedia
The Kyoto Prefectural Police work the two cases as a pattern
It’s 1978. Japan isn’t the Wild East, but there have been some yak disputes lately leading to gang-based gunplay. Are these attempted robberies an offshoot of organized crime?
The world is not yet CCTV’d. Detectives get statements from bank guy and post office woman. They canvass the byways of central Kyoto. Everyone agrees: you’re looking for one porky specimen of criminal intent.
The First Stolen Gun
The fat moron lobbed shots around the streets of downtown Kyoto on August 21st. Two days beforehand, August 19th, a policeman had noticed his gun had upped and disappeared from the gunsafe at Nishijin Police Station.
Things like this tend get bosses fired, so the bosses immediately set up a special investigation unit to find the gun.
August 20th, the day between the weapon going missing and the motorbike and post office jobs, someone calling themselves “Tanaka” — essentially, in Japan, “John Doe” — calls the cops, saying they have the piece and will return it soon.
Noon the next day: the motorbike and post office crimes.
A few hours after those go down, the mysterious Tanaka gets back on the pipe: “I still have the gun,” he says, “I've fired all the bullets. I'll send the empty shells to you.”
“Tanaka” hangs up. The call is traced — a public phone box. Eyewitnesses to the caller? None.
The cops realize their nightmare scenario is coming true: a nutbag is using a police gun in a crime spree.
They don’t yet realize the truth is much worse.
The Junibo Police Box, summer 2024. Image: The Kyote
Less than 24 hours later the cases are blown wide open
The investigators, facing the prospect of a grindy, excruciating case with a megalomaniac suspect, instead quickly catch a stroke of good fortune: Masaharu Hirota, a patrol sergeant assigned to the Junibo Police Box, bounds into headquarters and tells his bosses how the pseudonymed suspect Tanaka has called him at home and revealed where the stolen police pistol is hidden: on the grounds of Rokusonno Shrine, close to Kyoto Station.
The team pulls out in a fleet of patrol cars. Sirens fill the streets. The cops get on the vehicles’ blown-out loudspeakers and implore drivers to get the hell out of the way, please.
Rokusunno Shrine gets thoroughly turned over. Look under the vermillion lanterns. Someone fingertip the bridge over Shinryu Pond. Anyone checked behind the statue of Benzaiten? Finally, a police issue .38 with four live rounds and one spent is found.
The shrine is dedicated to 10th century samurai Minamoto-no-Tsunemoto. Unusually for a shrine there’s a gravestone. The cops line up before it, bowing their heads in gratitude. Tsunemoto’s a guardian deity to career success. At least now no one’s going to get murdered with an official weapon. The cops donate their pocket change for the shrine’s upkeep then peel out again.
Sergeant Masaharu Hirota gets approximately 3 minutes of glory before his colleagues start asking themselves why he was the chosen recipient of the latest “Tanaka” call, plus isn’t he one of the people with access to the Nishijin Police State gunsafe where the gun disappeared from, plus doesn’t he fit the descriptions of the fat ugly street shooter?
Sergeant Hirota is invited for coffee and cigarettes with the investigators.
Patrol sergeant Masaharu Hirota in later, even worse, times. Image: Goo
* * *
Who are you?
Born in Osaka, Masaharu Hirota moved to Chiba Prefecture as a child, where he grew up with his farmer parents. After graduating from high school he told his brother that he was set on becoming a cop, at which his brother laughed and pointed out Masaharu was “a coward who would not go outside alone after dark”1, the kind of reaction that Bertie Wooster would call a bit of facer.
After working at various irregular office jobs, he moved back to western Japan, where late one night (presumably having overcome his fear of the dark) he was stopped by a police officer on Gojo Street in Kyoto. The officer took a shine to Masaharu, and after the questioning asked him if he would like to become a police officer.
Dream restored, Masaharu packed in his job at a noodle manufacturer, passed the police recruitment exam, graduated from the Kyoto Prefectural Police Academy and was assigned to the Patrol Division of Kujo Police Station in southern Kyoto.
His career seemed to begin decently. In March 1968 he received the Chief's Annual for Excellence due to his high arrest rate. He got married, three kids. Life is good.
He passed the promotion exam to sergeant, and in March 1972 he was assigned to Mineyama Police Station, where he served two years as a patrol officer, racking up four Chief's Commendations. He was considered “full of energy and reliable.”
Then again, he would argue with senior officers, get sulky and rebel against the instructions of his superiors — and had picked up a gruesome gambling habit.
He requested a transfer to Nishijin Police Station, the central station in Kyoto City and from March of 1977 he was assigned to the Junibo Police Box. He started bitching and moaning to colleagues. “I busted my balls to become a sergeant, but now people are ripping me for still being a patrol goon.”
The gambling got worse. An obsession with horse racing grew. Then for another one of the rare Japanese sports that allow wagers to be placed — boat racing. He even went into azuki bean trading, about which we know nothing except it must be the kind of thing where a bunch of sharpsters rip off the lured-in civilians.
Soon Hirota was taking time off work to do the rounds of “consumer lending companies”, AKA loan sharks in decent suits, to get enough cash to pay back the bookies.
* * *
Coffee and cigarettes with investigators ended with Hirota denying everything and refusing a polygraph, but he was arrested anyway, plus fired.
After coming up with a cornucopia of bullshit abilis for the street shooting/post office spree (he’d gone out to buy a newspaper, taken his child for a walk, was chatting with a chum at home at the time), soon he gave up and confessed it all — the gun theft, the Tanaka calls, motorbike man and post office woman.
Motive? Hirota said he’d heard rumors that his direct superior was shit-talking him for being absent from work, so he spontaneously (i.e. without criminal intent!) stole the gun to get the guy in trouble.
Hirota gave up the post office robbery and motorcyclist pot-shot too — he was intending to rob him, but denied any intent to kill, and the case was charged as attempted robbery rather than attempted murder — which was excessively generous to say the least, and would come back to bite the police later.
Then, after getting it all off his chest, Hirota unconfessed it all again. It wasn’t me, honest! I just got a weird call from this Tanaka guy, I swear!
This was going to become his pattern.
How dare you accuse me!
It was me all along, you dopes!
And guess what? You made me do it!
Actually it wasn’t me at all — and I won’t be your scapegoat!
Hirota turned out to be one of those people who want to project their resentments at grandiose scale and on innocent people, while avoiding any responsibility for the consequences.
* * *
Hirota fought the trial like a jungle beast.
It was all bullshit. He was framed. His confession was bunk. The police are corrupt. Chief Konishi is corrupt.
He spat on reporters outside the courtroom.
They gave him seven years.
He responded with typical charm:
When I am released from prison, I intend to get revenge on the Kyoto Prefectural Police. Otherwise, I will never be able to die in peace. (出所した折りは、私は京都府警に対し「ふくしゅう」をしてやるつもりでいます。そうでなければ私は死んでも死にきれないのです。)2
Officer Shikano was murdered at the top of these steps. Image: The Kyote
The Kyoto Murder & the Second Stolen Gun
Hirota was granted parole and released on August 30, 1984.
He traveled to Tokyo by Shinkansen with his mother. He went straight to the Chiba Probation Office and had an interview with his probation officer. He listened obediently to the shpiel on staying out of trouble. “I want to help my mother with farming for a while until I find a job.”
That evening, another probation officer paid a visit to Hirota’s family home, and found him chatting away with mother, catching up, manifesting his desires to be a help around the place, a good father to his kids, a credit to the family he let down etc. etc. — this was a reformed man, you understand.
Three days later Hirota tells mother he’s off to Tokyo to look for a job. Not exactly — he jumped straight on the Shinkansen to Kyoto to begin the revenge tour.
Back in the town where he used to patrol the streets, Hirota preps up: gets himself a kitchen knife and a crossbow and the rudiments of a disguise — sunglasses, a hat.
Then he hits a public phone and tries to lure himself a policeman.
Chosen method? The kind of deeply annoying call he used to bust his hump on every single day: “Excuse me, I told you about an abandoned motorbike at the local park yesterday but you still haven’t dealt with it! My taxes pay your wages you know!”
He does the trick on two different police boxes but each time chickens out before the cops arrive.
September 4th, he refines the payback playbook: he’s going to f*ck with his old police box. His former beat. The streets he patrolled will be where he gets back at the cops, the world, God.
He puts in the call.
Junibo Police Box, it’s short-manned that day. There’s only one cop there. His surname is Shikano. Hirota lures him out with another bullshit report: you gotta come to the slopes of Funaokayama. I’ve called you about this several times now!
Funaokayama is the hill that was the geographic starting point when the Imperial government decided to establish a new capital in Kyoto. The domain of Genbu, the tortoise guardian of the north, protecting the city from evil spirits. Home of Kenkun Shrine, dedicated to Oda Nobunaga, the great 16th century warlord.
Shikano radios Nishijin Police Station to tell them he’s leaving the police box unmanned, then gets on his moped and does the journey from the police box to the hill in 2 minutes.
He parks and heads up the steps on the lower slopes and Hirota meets him with a kitchen knife and carves him up, 15 seperate wounds. Probably Shikano was already doomed, but Hirota makes sure: steals his gun then stands over him and shoots him in the back.
For the second time Hirota had stolen a police gun — and this time he’d done murder too.
Shikano, grievously injured, managed to get on his radio and plead for help before he stroked out and died.
With no way to pinpoint his location, the Nishijin Police Station emptied and swarms of cops grid-searched the neighborhood, until 20 minutes later they found their colleague deceased in a lake of his own blood.
By that time Hirota was already on his way to the next murder.
September 2018. Police officers mark the 34th anniversary of Officer Shikano’s death. Location. Image: Kyoto Prefectural Police Headquarters.
* * *
The Osaka Murder
The cop(s) had got what they deserved.
So now we’re onto the next target: the loan companies who won best supporting actor in the demolition of our life.
Let’s board the train to Osaka. We’re headed for Loans Takara. Those assholes don’t know what’s about to hit them.
We get off the train at Kyobashi Station. It’s hot. Let’s savor the moment a while. Let’s stop for some lemon flavored shaved ice and a cup of water.
Sunglasses on and it’s a glorious day. The shaved ice really hits the spot.
We mooch down the road to our target.
16:00, up we go in the elevator — Takara’s on the 2nd floor.
Doors open.
We walk up to the counter. Here’s a young kid, 23, in a suit.
Out comes the gun, right in his kisser.
“Give me the money”
This Loans Takara kid, it turns out, is no brain surgeon. He looks at the gun. He thinks it’s a joke. “You’re kidding!”
“Give me the money”.
The kid is reflected twice in the lenses of our sun-specs.
“This is a joke, right?” he repeats.
Once, a few years ago, a woman in a post office refused to give it up, and we pedaled away penniless from the scene of the crime.
Not this time.
Boom.
The kid goes down clutching his chest.
No joke, son.
Second kill of the day.
Turn to the girl in the back: she knows what’s up.
We bounce down the stairs three at a time with ¥600,000 in cash in our hands.
* * *
We piss away half of it that night at a hostess bar.
All the girls drank champagne on us.
We tell them we’re from Chiba, we used to be a cop in Kyoto plus f*ck the Kyoto police.
The next day we Shinkansen back to Tokyo, but our heart’s not in it.
We need everyone to know how monumental you guys made our resentment.
Back in Chiba now it’s time to claim our glory. We straight-up call the Nishijin Police Station front desk and tell them it’s me, you dopes, Hirota!
Oh, and by the way, I did nothing! I’m being framed — again!
We’re arrested the next day.
They bring us back on the train, and half of Japan’s press is right there with us asking questions.
As usual, we drag out the court case with hot garbage like “mysterious Mr X” who could 100% alibi us for both the dead cop and the dead loan kid if only Mr X would come out of the woodwork.
We’re sentenced to death. Off to death row we go, screaming and complaining.
Our story is almost over.
* * *
The Mosquito in the 10th Floor
Masaharu Hirota was cop and cop killer, law enforcer and law breaker, a living, swaggering contradiction, a rageaholic who reached his limit and refused to continue living by the rules of your society.
Newsflash: actors love that shit — the fact Hirota was a pig-ugly slob-liar and fat bastard did not matter one iota — and it was only a matter of time before he transmuted into celluloid hero in the manner of Tom Hardy’s turn in Bronson or Eric Bana’s Chopper.
Former pretty boy singer Yūya Uchida stepped up to make the role his own. He had a checkered past of his own: arrested in September 1977 for violating Japan's Cannabis Control Law, he somehow escaped prosecution despite later admitting he had been caught bang to rights, then managed to go scott-free again in 1983 after allegedly threatening a rock promoter with a kitchen knife.
The film is called The Mosquito in the 10th Floor (十階のモスキート), and in true movie star God-ego manner Uchida decided he was going to write the script too — or rather, he wanted credit for writing the script after scribbling down some bullshit and getting a writer to do the actual writing.
Like any good vanity production, Mosquito begins with our rogue hero banging a nubile chick to orgasm, before proceeding through scenes of a brooding Uchida gambling, hanging out at the local bar, and even some occasional policing.
Despite some potentially interesting touches like a scene shot wild in the Tokyo subway, avant-garde sound drop-outs, an occasional roving camera and a (very intermittent) John Carpenter-ish synth score, Uchida and his co-writer/director Yōichi Sai make a pig’s ear of what could have been a gonzo classic. These guys never met a scene they didn’t repeat. Uchida gets a phone call at the police box from his meglobitch ex-wife demanding alimony, twice. Uchida’s colleagues explain the sucking-up required to get ahead in the police force, twice. Uchida loses money at the boat races, twice. Uchida duns loan companies for money, twice. Uchida visits Harajuku and sees his estranged teenage daughter dancing with some rockabilly ruffians, twice. The loan companies call the police box demanding repayment, twice. Uchida makes the local bar girl cum like the clappers, twice.
Strangely enough, Uchida buys a (then rare) PC, and mucks around with it, twice.
Did we say Uchida’s performance was brooding? We meant wooden. He doesn’t emote once until the end of the picture, and by then it’s too late.
One star, would not watch again.
* * *
Still rotting in prison today
The real Masaharu Hirota has spent the last 27 years on death row. As is usual in Japan, an execution date has not been set; he will be informed of the execution on the same day it occurs.
The UN says keeping death row inmates in this state of permanent, daily terror amounts to torture. We think it doesn’t sound like a nice plate of sushi either.
* * *
More
Here: Wikipedia (Japanese only)
The Mosquito in the 10th Floor is available on Youtube in its entirety, complete with English subtitles (they decided to film in Chiba Prefecture though rather than Kyoto, which is some straight bullshit)
* * *
Torture Garden?
Incidentally, when The Kyote passed by Kamigyōku Police Station (formally Nishijin Police Station) to get some pics to illustrate this article, we heard an unholy racket.
We ducked around to the back of the building, confirming the noise was coming from an upper floor. Now, we’re no experts on torture, but to our ears it resembled the sound of a whip, then agonized male and female moans.
Here’s the footage so you can decide just what the hell is going on inside that place:
Enjoy The Kyote this time? Check this out next: Wanna Confess a Murder?
We’ll see each other again next week,
The Kyote
Comment? Just Hit Reply
The Kyote is published in Kyoto, Japan every Sunday at 19:00 JST
https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E4%BA%AC%E9%83%BD%E3%83%BB%E5%A4%A7%E9%98%AA%E9%80%A3%E7%B6%9A%E5%BC%B7%E7%9B%97%E6%AE%BA%E4%BA%BA%E4%BA%8B%E4%BB%B6
https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E4%BA%AC%E9%83%BD%E3%83%BB%E5%A4%A7%E9%98%AA%E9%80%A3%E7%B6%9A%E5%BC%B7%E7%9B%97%E6%AE%BA%E4%BA%BA%E4%BA%8B%E4%BB%B6#%E6%87%B2%E5%BD%B97%E5%B9%B4%E3%81%8C%E7%A2%BA%E5%AE%9A
Wow, this was your liveliest newsletter yet! The guy is unbelievable!