Japan court sentences arsonist to death for deadly attack on Kyoto Animation studio
Tokyo (CNN) — A Japanese court on Thursday sentenced a 45-year-old man to death for setting fire to the renowned Kyoto Animation studio in 2019, which left 36 people dead in the country’s worst mass killing in almost 20 years, according to public broadcaster NHK.
Posted — UpdatedThe defendant, Shinji Aoba, was charged with murder and arson after telling police his work had been plagiarized and that he used gasoline to set fire to the studio. He was found guilty by the Kyoto District Court on Thursday.
Dozens of people were inside the three-story building at the time of the blaze, which spread so rapidly that many did not have time to escape, police said at the time. All those who died were employees, with at least 32 others injured.
The fire marked the worst mass killing in the country since a 2001 arson attack on a building in Tokyo’s Kabukicho district, which killed 44 people. The death toll surpassed the infamous Tokyo sarin gas attack on a subway in 1995, which killed 13.
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