Kanagawa prefectural police have arrested a 24-year-old man from Kyoto on suspicion of abandoning the body of a woman in a hotel room on Thursday.
Police said the suspect, Kyotaro Tsuchiya, whose occupation is unknown, turned himself in at a police station in Fuji, Shizuoka Prefecture, on Saturday, Kyodo News reported. He was accompanied by a relative.
Police said Tsuchiya told them he beat the woman, whose name and age have not yet been released, and apparently killed her. He said he put her body in the closet and left the hotel. However, several hours after his arrest, Tsuchiya changed his story and denied killing the woman, police said.
The hotel is located in Kohoku Ward, about 700 meters west of Shin-Yokohama Station.
Police said the woman checked into the hotel on Wednesday. Hotel staff said a man was with her when she checked in. He was seen leaving the hotel by himself earlier on Thursday.
When the woman failed to check out of the hotel on Thursday afternoon, a hotel employee went to the room and found the body in a closet at around 6:20 p.m.
Police said the woman had bruises on her face and that an autopsy on Friday revealed the cause of death as spinal cord damage.
© Japan Today