Gundam 00 Assistant Director Masaki Kitamura Arrested [news]

[LVUER]

Suspect denies posting threat on Osaka's site after police ID'ed his wireless IP address

Police in Osaka arrested 42-year-old anime technical director Masaki Kitamura on Sunday on suspicion of writing "I will commit a massacre" on the city's website. According to the police, the suspect denied the charges, saying, "I'm completely innocent."

The suspect is accused of going to Osaka's inquiry page on the Internet and writing, "I will commit a massacre in Otaroad [in Osaka's Nipponbashi area] next Sunday. I will ram into pedestrian paradise, and after stabbing indiscriminately with a knife, I will commit suicide" on July 29 at about 9:45 p.m.

Except the suicide part, the threat is similar to the killing of seven people that took place in Tokyo's Akihabara district in 2008. "Pedestrian paradise" is the traditional practice of cordoning vehicles off a particular street or streets and limiting the area to foot traffic. Nipponbashi's Otaroad is essentially Osaka's otaku shopping counterpart to Tokyo's Akihabara.

According to the authorities, they analyzed the IP address that originated the threat and discovered it was linked to a high-speed wireless LAN device owned by Kitamura.

Kitamura was an assistant director on both seasons of Mobile Suit Gundam 00. He was also a director of the 10th installment of Gundam Evolve and an episode director on Ergo Proxy, GUNxSWORD, Intrigue in the Bakumatsu - Irohanihoheto, Planetes, Wolf's Rain, and other series.

Source: Just google the topic thread...

My opinion that also shared by many other people: He was HACKED!

[nyaatrap]

I tried to search on japanese articles and I found it's useless without knowing Chinese characters of names to search something in Japanese... oh useless google ┐(´д｀)┌ﾔﾚﾔﾚ

edit: Found an search word now, "北村真咲"

[nyaatrap]

OK.. It's really weird the message from "his" IP address, because the message demands to release Shoko Asahara, one of the worst criminal 99.99% of Japanese hate to death. That means 99.99% of Japanese doesn't write this message.. unless he's joking.
So there's 2 possibilities: He was hacked, or he was joking (and the latter is illegal qualified to be jailed)

[Tetiel]

That's awful :\ I hope he gets released soon (since it seems highly unlikely that a professional person would be stupid enough to post something like that).

I'd say definitely hacked after what you said, nyaa. I can't imagine anyone (besides members of Aum) would want Asahara released and nobody in their right mind would say that in jest where it can be recorded. It almost sounds like someone wanted a guaranteed way for him to get arrested.

[Samu-kun]

Tsk, tsk... Reminds me of a case in the US where SWAT operatives smashed into a house and held a 16 year old girl captive because some fool used her wireless connection to post on the internet about blowing up the police station. Don't forget to password lock your wireless connections people!

[nyaatrap]

I forgot this incident and just remembered today. This was a false arrest. He got an virus "iesys.exe" and it sent messages. He is completely innocence.

[dramspringfeald]

lol has a bit of a GITS feel to it.

[nyaatrap]

He had just downloaded a free application from 2ch, then police broke into his room suddenly and arrested him for 1 month never believing what he was saying... what a horror story.

[dramspringfeald]

If I remember, this has happened to him before, like 2005 or 2006 so.... so MAYBE he's not so innocent. Not to mention the stories from his mangas, anime and the like have all been VERY anti-imperial japan. often attacking them for being evil and corrupt.

[PyTom]

If I remember, this has happened to him before, like 2005 or 2006 so.... so MAYBE he's not so innocent. Not to mention the stories from his mangas, anime and the like have all been VERY anti-imperial japan. often attacking them for being evil and corrupt.

Isn't that something of a non-seqitur? Being against Imperial Japan - especially now, nearly 70 years later - shouldn't be the sort of thing that gets you arrested.

[LVUER]

At least the cop do their job, albeit not very smart... This applies to Masaki himself too, if this had happened to him in the past.