Kabuki Actor Ichikawa Ennosuke to Be Arrested over Father’s Suicide

Yomiuri Shimbun file photo
Ichikawa Ennosuke

The Metropolitan Police Department intends to arrest kabuki actor Ichikawa Ennosuke as early as Tuesday on suspicion of assisting the suicide of his father, according to MPD sources.

According to the sources, the MPD suspect that Ennosuke allegedly gave a large number of sleeping pills to his father Ichikawa Danshiro, 76, and let him take them at his home in Meguro Ward, Tokyo, between 5 p.m. May 17 and 10 a.m. May 18.

When the kabuki star was arrested on June 27 in relation to the death of his mother, 75-year-old Nobuko Kinoshi, he was quoted by investigators saying that he gave their parents glasses of water mixed with grounded up sleeping pills. According to police, Ennosuke said that he and his parents had discussed committing suicide and decided to do so together after his harassment behavior was reported in a weekly magazine.