21-year-old gets 23 years over robbery-murder in western Tokyo

Japan's Tokyo District Court on Friday sentenced a former university student to 23 years in prison over a high-profile robbery and murder case in Komae, western Tokyo, last year.

According to the ruling by the district court's Tachikawa branch, on January 19, 2023, Issei Nakanishi, the 21-year-old former student, conspired with Rikuto Nagata, 22, who is charged over the same crime, and others to break into the house of a 90-year-old woman in Komae.

Nakanishi was party to a fatal assault against the woman and theft of four items, including a luxury wristwatch, worth approximately 590,000 yen (US$4,13) in total.

In the Komae case, three other people apart from Nakanishi and Nagata have been indicted on the same charges, including 40-year-old Yuki Watanabe, who is a suspected ringleader of the criminal group "Luffy" responsible for a string of robberies across Japan.

The ruling was the first on the Komae case. Prosecutors had sought a prison sentence of 25 years.