Woman Abandons Newborn Baby Inside Suitcase, Hides It In Closet

A woman has been accused of abandoning her newborn baby inside a suitcase and hiding the bag inside a closet in Hino City, Tokyo, Japan.

The mother, Chihiro Fukushima, 23, a part-time worker, was arrested by Hino City police officers on suspicion of corpse abandonment after the body of her newborn boy was found inside a suitcase hidden in a closet on Sunday, June 5, Japan Today reported.

On Sunday, Fukushima’s mother noticed an unusually strong and strange odor coming from her daughter’s room. When she went inside the room to check the source of the smell, she discovered that it was coming from inside her daughter’s closet. She subsequently discovered a suitcase hidden in it. When Fukushima’s mother opened the bag, she discovered a newborn baby’s corpse stuffed inside the suitcase and immediately called emergency services for help.

The authorities responded to the scene and took Fukushima into custody for questioning. During the interrogation, Fukushima, who lives with her parents in Hino City, Tokyo, admitted to committing the horrific crime. She told the officers that she gave birth to the baby at the end of the month of May and then placed the baby inside the suitcase and hid it inside her closet.

In a similar but unrelated incident, a 24-year-old woman was arrested on May 26, 2021, by the Kagoshima Prefectural Police for allegedly leaving the corpse of her newborn boy in a plastic bag to rot at her residence in Kagoshima City, Latin Times reported.

The woman, identified as Miyuki Kawabata, reportedly alerted emergency services on May 9, 2021, and told them that she gave birth to a child five days ago and that the boy had died. When emergency personnel arrived at the woman’s residence in the Kamoike area, they found the newborn's remains dumped inside a plastic bag. The baby’s body reportedly did not show any signs of external wounds with his umbilical cord still intact, Kagoshima Prefectural Police said.

After giving birth to the baby, Kawabata reportedly went to a hospital and stayed there until she was released on May 26. Upon her release, police charged her with abandoning her own baby’s corpse.

“Abandoning the corpse was not my intention,” she had said after being ambushed by reporters outside the health facility, denying the allegations raised against her.

“After giving birth, I have no memory”, she said.