A 48-year-old Japanese woman has been arrested after allegedly hiding her mother's corpse in a freezer for approximately ten years, reportedly out of fear of eviction. Yumi Yoshino was taken into custody on suspicion of abandoning and concealing a female body, police confirmed.
The body was discovered on Wednesday inside a freezer in a Tokyo apartment by a cleaner, who found it hidden in a closet. Yoshino had been forced to vacate the property in mid-January due to unpaid rent, according to local media reports citing unnamed police sources.
Yoshino told investigators that when her mother died about a decade ago, she concealed the remains because she worried she would be forced to leave the flat they shared. The mother, believed to be around 60 at the time of her death, was the named leaseholder of the apartment in a municipal housing complex, as reported by Kyodo News.
An autopsy has so far been unable to determine the exact time or cause of the woman's death, the reports added. The case has drawn significant media attention in Japan, highlighting the lengths to which some individuals may go to avoid losing their homes.
