The newspapers were all over this. Three bodies were found in an apartment in Kawasaki yesterday. All had been stabbed to death. A tenant in the apartment building admitted to carrying out the killings. The victims were the landlord, the landlord’s brother, and the brother’s wife. The suspect had lived in the building for five years and had a reputation for drinking and not always being on time with the rent.According to a local restaurant owner who knew  the suspect and the victims, the suspect often complained about the landlord’s brother, who lived next door to him in the building. He said that the brother and his wife made a lot of noise and ran their very loud washing machine early in the morning. He complained but apparently nothing ever happened. Also, the landlord scolded the tenant often for being late with his rent, causing bad feelings all around.

The reports named the building as “Koeiso” and said that the units in the building shared a common toilet. Obviously the apartment building is quite old (“-so” was a common suffix for apartment buildings built during the 50s and 60s), which means that the walls were probably very thin. These days, in fact, such apartments tend to be occupied by foreign workers since they’re so cheap.