NEWS: Nine Suicides Near Tokyo Raise Alarm of Internet Suicide Pacts

ap.tbo.com
The cases - involving young people in their teens and 20s - raised alarm over suicide agreements, many of which are made by people who meet over the Internet. They have claimed dozens of lives and shocked Japan over the past several years.

Tuesday"s suicide of four young men and three women in the van would be the largest group suicide yet, the National Police Agency said.

Authorities found the rented van in a deserted mountain lot after a friend of one of the seven who had received an e-mail hinting at suicide called the police, but officers failed to reach it in time, a police spokesman in Saitama prefecture, just outside Tokyo, said on condition of anonymity.

The van windows were sealed with vinyl tape from the inside and the seven were found slumped over in their seats, the spokesman said. A woman sat in the driver"s seat, while the six others sat in two rows behind her.

Investigators found four charcoal stoves in the car that they believe the group used to poison themselves. No external wounds or signs of a struggle were found.

The Saitama police said they believed the seven died of carbon monoxide poisoning, and ordered autopsies.

In a separate incident, two women were found dead in a car parked outside an isolated temple in Yokosuka, about 60 miles to the southeast, a Kanagawa prefecture police spokesman said. They were in the car"s back seat, with two charcoal stoves on the floor. The car windows were sealed with a black plastic tarp.

Police said it was not immediately known whether the two cases were related. They were still trying to determine the identities of the men and women.




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