1st LD Writethru: Japanese man killing, dismembering 9 people charged with 2nd murder

TOKYO, Dec. 11 (Xinhua) -- Japanese man Takahiro Shiraishi on Monday was charged by the police with the murder in October of a 25-year-old woman.

It is the second such warrant served on Shiraishi who has admitted to killing and dismembering nine people in his apartment near Tokyo.

The 27-year-old suspect is being investigated for murdering Kazumi Maruyama from Yokohama and keeping her dead body in his apartment in Zama near Tokyo.

According to investigative sources, the victim was reported missing on Oct. 18.

Maruyama's cellphone was found stashed in a garbage bag in Shiraishi's room during the police's searches, investigative accounts revealed.

The case rocked the nation as many of Shiraishi's victims had posted suicidal wishes and thoughts on popular social media sites, such as Twitter.

Shiraishi, a self-confessed serial killer, allegedly met his vulnerable victims online before luring them to his apartment.

But Shiraishi apparently informed the police that he did not think his victims really wanted to die as they resisted his attacks.

Shiraishi was initially arrested and taken into custody in late October and charged about three weeks later for the alleged murder of Aiko Tamura, 23.

The murder of Tamura is believed to have taken place at his Kanagawa Prefecture apartment after she went missing on Oct. 23.

A message was posted on Tamura's Twitter account on Sept. 20, according to local media, saying she was "looking for someone who will die with me."

The message said she "wants to die, but is scared of dying alone."

Subsequent investigations revealed that Tamura had been exchanging messages online with Shiraishi.

Security camera footage, broadcast by local media, also showed the pair walking together on Oct. 23 at Hachioji station in Tokyo, and at another station near Shiraishi's apartment.

During the police's initial search of Shiraishi's apartment, they found a cooler box with the dismembered body parts of two people, local media reported.

The remains of seven other people in his apartment were subsequently found, local media quoted police investigators as saying.

Police said Shiraishi confessed to killing the women soon after he met her and said he used the bath in his apartment to cut up the bodies and disposed of some of the body parts in the garbage.

Investigators retrieved a saw from his apartment believed to have been used to dismember the bodies.

Police investigations are ongoing to determine whether evidence pertaining to the seven remaining victims could lead to Shiraishi being charged with further cases of murder.

Of all his potential victims, eight of them were female and one was male.

All of the victims were aged between 15 and 26 years old.

Their dismembered body parts were discovered by investigators in multiple cooling boxes in Shiraishi's apartment.

While some residents in the same apartment building had noticed a foul smell coming from his room since August, others described Shiraishi as being "a cheerful, kind and polite man." Enditem