Takeshige Hamada

was a Japanese serial killer who, together with his wife and two accomplices, murdered three people over life insurance policies in Fukuoka from 1978 to 1979. He was sentenced to death for his crimes, but died before he could be executed. At the time of his death, at the age of 90, he was the oldest convict on death row.

Early life Takeshige Hamada was born on March 10, 1927, in the small town of Noda, Kagoshima (present-day Izumi). His father died of an unspecified illness when he was five years old, leaving behind a debt of 60 yen that his mother and uncle had to pay for.

Due to the family's poor financial situation, Hamada did not wear pants, and had to attend physical education using pants provided by the school staff. He also never wore sneakers or boots, and on sunny days wore straw sandals. Hamada later claimed that one of his teachers would always give him a bento after classes, a kind act that made him work harder than others. While he only attended three of the six years of elementary school, Hamada excelled at math and the soroban, always scoring 100 points at the latter and competing solo in tournaments with it.

Immediately after graduating elementary school in March 1939, Hamada's uncle got him a job at a kamaboko store in Ōmuta. There, he would often drive a trike to go buy ice cream, and was often entrusted with work related to the soroban or books, but not long after the Pacific War began, he was drafted to serve in the army.

On October 20, 1943, he was sent to work at a Kyushu Hikoki factory based behind what is now Minami-Fukuoka Station, and on weekends, he was engaged in airplane assembly work while simultaneously continuing working at the kamaboko store. In July 1945, Hamada was informed that he was going to be transferred to the Fujisawa Navy Air Corps in Kanagawa Prefecture as a maintenance engineer on September 1, but this was prematurely cut short due to the end of the war.

After the end of the war, Hamada found employment at the Japanese National Railways at the recommendation of his older brother, where he worked along railroad crossings, but abruptly quit not long after.

Petty crimes After leaving the Japanese National Railways, Hamada found work at the Toyobo factory in Yamaguchi Prefecture, where he worked alongside people from his hometown. One day, after being invited by a friend to have lunch, he abruptly quit; it was later discovered that he had been stealing supplies from the employees' dormitory.

Hamada was arrested for the crime in August 1946, and tried to explain himself to the arresting officer by claiming that the victim "did not deserve compensation because [he] was poor". When this was presented at his trial, the angered judge refused to give him a suspended sentence, and gave a 1-year sentence at the Kagoshima Prison. Hamada would be arrested twice for theft following his release, and while serving time at the Miyazaki Prison, his mother died from an illness. Taking into account his personal circumstances, Hamada was pardoned by the Parole Board.

After briefly working as a coal miner in Saga Prefecture, he returned to his previous job at the kamaboko store.

Despite the fact that he was expecting a child soon, Hamada continued stealing. He was eventually arrested after he was caught stealing wires from a nearby paddy field, which he planned to sell to buy clothing for the newborn. After his release, he moved the family to Fukuoka and started working as a taxi driver, but would be arrested twice more: once for auto theft and another for participating in a shoplifting gang. In total, he had spent 17 years in prison prior to beginning his murder spree.

Murders According to Hamada, the incentive for the murders arose after his wife lent 7 million yen to his 42-year-old associate from the shoplifting group. As a result, he turned towards life insurance policies to gather money quickly.

On March 25, 1978, Hamada and his 50-year-old wife went to the latter's house in Shime, where she was living with a 28-year-old female relative. The pair, they plied her with what's described as either alcohol or a sleeping pill depending on the source, then dragged the woman to the bathtub, where they held her head underwater until she drowned. The autopsy report erroneously determined the cause of death as heart failure, and the Hamadas became the beneficiaries of her life insurance policies, all of which amounted to 1.5 million yen.

Approximately three months later, on July 1, Hamada's wife was tasked with watching over her 16-year-old son-in-law, a high school student, who was left with them as her brother was suffering from an illness. At her suggestion, Hamada made the teenager inhale paint thinner, and while he was unconscious, he took him to an agricultural waterway in Umi, about 4 kilometers away from the house, where he held him underwater until he drowned.

On April 17, the trio chose a 37-year-old with no known relatives, whom they insured in a contract for 60 million yen provided by the Mitsui Life Insurance Company, paying 30,000 yen as an insurance premium. As the man was known as a heavy drinker, the criminals devised a plot to stage a hit-and-run while he was out wandering the streets.

On March 29, 1982, the three defendants were found guilty by Justice Shigeomi Akiyoshi, who addressed Hamada as a "greedy, systematically calm killer of relatives who claims no responsibility for the crimes and shows no regrets". Not long, as per the prosecutors' request, Hamada was sentenced to death, while "A" and "B" were both sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment as accomplices (the latter's sentence would later be reduced by two years).

On June 19, 1984, Hamada and "B" attempted to appeal their sentences before Justice Shigeru Yamamoto, who promptly dismissed them and upheld the initial verdicts. On March 8, 1988, Hamada appealed again, this time before Justice Masami Ito, with his attorneys claiming that the 1978 deaths were incidental and that his confessions were unreliable. In response, Ito dismissed the claim, saying that the convict's confessions were reinforced by those of his late wife and additional evidence reinforcing his guilt. By doing this, he effectively finalized the death sentence. During the process, 20 anti-death penalty activists who were attending the proceedings shouted out "Don't enforce the death penalty", resulting in the dismissal of one of them.

Imprisonment and death In the following years on death row, Hamada would unsuccessfully petition for a retrial twice, but was rejected both times.

Around midnight on June 26, 2017, a prison guard patrolling the death row noticed that the sleeping Hamada had begun vomiting. When medical personnel was brought in, they found that he was not breathing, and quickly transported him to a nearby hospital in Fukuoka. There he was kept on artificial ventilation and was given CPR by the hospital staff, but died two hours after his arrival, aged 90. His cause of death was listed as asphyxiation. At the time of his death, he was the oldest convict housed on Japan's death row.