Former care worker rearrested for another murder

Jiji Press

8:44 JST, December 30, 2021

MITO (Jiji Press) — The police served a former employee of a nursing home in the eastern prefecture of Ibaraki with an additional arrest warrant on Wednesday on suspicion of killing a resident.

The 36-year-old former employee, Megumi Akama, was initially arrested on Dec. 8 on suspicion of murdering a different resident, Setsuji Yoshida, then 76, on July 6, 2020, by injecting air into a syringe connected to an intravenous tube attached to his leg.

Ibaraki prefectural police served Akama with the additional warrant for allegedly killing Kisaku Suzuki, then 84, on May 30, 2020, by injecting air into a syringe connected to an intravenous tube attached to his right hand.

Akama was seen entering Suzuki’s room alone before his health condition worsened, sources familiar with the investigation said. The prefectural police have not disclosed whether she admitted the allegations.

Both Suzuki and Yoshida died of acute circulatory failure caused by air embolism.

Akama worked at the nursing home in the city of Koga as a nurse between late April and mid-June 2020 and then as a care worker until early July that year. She was a nurse usually using syringes and intravenous tubes when Suzuki died.

She voluntarily resigned on the day of Yoshida’s death after she was questioned by her colleague about her suspicious behavior.