Anime fan sentenced to death in Japan (3 photos)

He wanted to send dozens of people to the next world. Now a one-way ticket awaits him.





Shinji Aoba was an ardent anime fan. I watched everything and even tried to do something creative - for example, I wrote novels and participated in all sorts of creative competitions.

And then he watched one of the cartoons from the Kyoto Animation studio and it seemed to him that in one of the scenes they accurately reproduced one of the chapters of his imperishable, but useless work. And he got mad.



Shinji Aoba

Shinji tried to prove the fact of plagiarism, but was sent away for a long time - the studio denied his fantasy, and the court did not even accept the case for trial. Then Aoba decided to act radically. He probably still had obvious problems with his head. At least at that time.

In 2019, an anime fan bought 40 liters of gasoline and broke into the Kyoto Animation studio. He started shouting “Die!” and generously pour gasoline all around you. And then he struck a lighter. He himself was covered in gasoline, so he was the first to burst into flames, then the fire engulfed the studio premises. There were 70 people in it, 32 were seriously injured: someone jumped out of a second-floor window and broke a leg, someone inhaled smoke, others received burns of varying degrees of severity.



The unfortunate arsonist suffered the most seriously: about 80% of his body was damaged and everyone thought that he would die. But the offended anime fan turned out to be resilient and began to recover; moreover, he was intensively treated and underwent several operations. So he recovered, but began to use a wheelchair - more for the image of a sufferer than for medical reasons. So he tried to pity the court.

Nothing worked out for him. Although his lawyers argued that he was mentally ill and was not responsible for his actions.

The court ruled that Aoba was sane, and therefore bears responsibility for what he did. And he sentenced him to death. Which one exactly is unknown. Most likely it will be an injection.

After the verdict was pronounced, the journalists managed to exchange a few words with the anime fan. Smurny, a 45-year-old man, admitted to them: he still went too far with the arson...