TOKYO: Japanese police have found nine bodies, including two with their heads severed and dumped in a cool box, in a flat in the Tokyo suburbs, media reported on Tuesday.
Police confirmed to media agencies they had arrested 27-year-old Takahiro Shiraishi, who lives in the apartment in Zama, south of Tokyo.
According to public broadcaster NHK, Shiraishi told police: “I killed them and did some work on the bodies in order to hide the evidence.”
Jiji Press said Shiraishi had told police that he chopped up the bodies in a bathroom and a saw was found in his room.
The bodies were of eight women and one man, several media reported.
A police spokesman could not immediately confirm these reports.
According to Jiji Press, police found the two heads inside a cool box at the entrance of the apartment before making the grisly discovery of the other bodies.
Police found the other bodies in a number of large boxes in the apartment, reports said.
Authorities had been investigating the disappearance of a 23-year-old woman and discovered a connection between her and Shiraishi.
This woman had earlier tweeted “I´m looking for someone to die with me,” according to the Sankei Shimbun daily.
Other media said Shiraishi and the woman had connected via a website featuring information about suicides.
Television pictures showed a heavy police presence blocking off a nondescript white-tiled terraced apartment.
CCTV captured Shiraishi and the 23-year-old woman walking together last Monday.
She had been missing since September 21 and her older brother called in her disappearance to police on Tuesday, the Asahi Shimbun reported.
