On Sunday evening, a 24-year-old man attacked passengers on a Tokyo train route.
As many as 17 individuals were hurt as they made their way to municipal Halloween festivities.
According to witnesses, the suspect was dressed as the Joker in a green shirt and purple suit.
He doused the carriage in a clear liquid and lit it on fire. Passengers were seen sprinting through carriages away from the fire on video.
One witness informed the Yomiuri newspaper about the incident, “I believed it was a Halloween trick.” “Then I noticed a guy slowly heading this direction, waving a large knife.”
The incident took place at Kokuryo station, in the city’s western outskirts, at around 20:00 local time (11:00 GMT). According to witnesses, the suspect was dressed in a vivid purple and green suit.
According to accounts in the media, the man was apprehended on the spot by police.
He informed authorities that he admired the Batman character Joker, according to news agency Kyodo.
In comic books, the Joker is a supervillain who is Batman’s archenemy. In the 2019 popular film Joker, starring Joaquin Phoenix, a scene in which he assaults several men on a train after being harassed by them was shown. It’s a watershed moment for the character, signaling the start of his metamorphosis into the Joker.
According to local media sources, the suspect informed officials that he intended to kill others so that he could be put to death.
According to the AP news agency, three of the injured suffered critical wounds, quoting the Tokyo Fire Department. According to local media, an elderly guy was stabbed and knocked unconscious.
Passengers can be seen fleeing away from the assailant, stumbling through a connecting door between carriages, and climbing through the train’s windows after it reached an emergency stop, according to video from the incident.
The scenario was “horrifying,” according to Shunsuke Kimura, who captured one of the recordings for the national NHK broadcaster. “We leaped from the windows since the train doors were closed and we had no idea what was going on,” he claimed.
Although violent crime is uncommon in Japan, a handful of high-profile knife assaults have occurred in recent years.
In August, a knife-wielding guy on another Tokyo commuter train harmed ten passengers. In Kawasaki, Japan, a man assaulted a gathering of youngsters waiting for a bus, killing two and wounding at least 18 others in 2019.
