For 21 Years Setsuko Miyazawa Keeps Waiting For Police Calls, Hoping The Killer Of Her Son's Family Arrested

Mikio Miyazaki's Family (Photo by Asahi newspaper)

JAKARTA - Setsuko Miyazawa (89 years old) always has hope from every incoming telephone ring. She wants the police to contact her and give her the good news that the murderer of his son's family 21 years ago has been caught.

The reality? Not at all.

Every day, Miyazawa waited for a call from the police. But that hasn't happened yet and it's become her daily routine to cross out every day on the calendar with a slash.

"I feel like every day is long, but time flies so fast, looking back," said Setsuko Miyazawa, quoted from the Asahi Shimbun.

Last December 2020, Setsuko Miyazawa visited her son's family home in Tokyo's Setagaya Ward. In this place on December 30, 2000, a vicious killer broke into the house.

Mikio Miyazawa (44 years old); wife Yasuko (41 years); his daughter Niina (8 years old) and son Rei (6 years old) were found dead on the morning of December 31, 2000. Rei was strangled to death. The other three were stabbed to death.

Quoted from the Asahi Shimbun, Setsuko Miyazawa at that time chose to be outside the house. Staring deeply into the two-story house and then venting her frustration because the murderers in this house can still roam big.

Mikio Miyazawa's family who became victims of murder (Setsuko Miyazawa via ABC)

"Why can't it be solved?" she regrets.

The killer allegedly broke into Mikio Miyazawa's family home from the second floor. The first one he met was Mikio's youngest son, Rei, who was then six years old and fast asleep. Rei's room was indeed the closest to the perpetrator's entrance window.

Without mercy, the perpetrator immediately strangled Rei to death. Rei later became the only victim found without any stab wounds or blood. However, in this room, most traces of the perpetrators were found.

Quoted from ichi.pro, the next victim is allegedly the father, Mikio. The police assumed that before the attack Mikio was working on the first floor. His body was found on the first floor, right next to the stairs. He had multiple wounds, mainly in the thigh and buttocks area, but stab wounds were also found on both arms, chest, and face. The cause of death was heavy blood loss from a stab wound to the chest. Police found fragments of a sashimi knife, the murder weapon, in his skull.

The last victim was Mikio's wife Yasuko and daughter Niina who were sleeping together on the top floor and accessed by a folding ladder on the second floor (near the bathroom). They were stabbed several times, especially in the face and neck area. First with the broken sashimi knife and then the all-purpose kitchen knife that the culprit must have gotten from this house.

Setsuko Miyazawa now can only reminisce when her grandchildren ran over to her like before. When she got off the bus at the bus stop closest to the house, the two children waiting outside ran up to her saying, "Grandma."

She let the children play in the garden before she prepared dinner. They always eat all the food she cooks. Her grandchildren bake cakes for her for Christmas and her birthday.

Miyazawa still vividly remembers how Nina sang and the days she cheered for the kids at the school sports festival.

Family is a source of fond memories for her.

“Why did the murder happen? Why did my very young grandchildren have to be killed?”