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TOKYO: A 24-year-old man dressed in Batman’s Joker costume attacked passengers on a Tokyo train line on Sunday evening, injuring 17 people as many headed into the city centre for Halloween gatherings.
Police arrested the suspected attacker on the spot, media reported. Local media reported at least 17 passengers were wounded, including one seriously. The suspect after stabbing passengers poured a liquid resembling oil and set fire.
A man believed to be in his 60s was unconscious and in critical condition after being stabbed, while witnesses also said the attacker had spread fluid around the train and started a fire, according to local media.
One video uploaded on Twitter showed a steady stream of people running away from a train car where, seconds later, a blaze lit up. Another video showed passengers rushing to squeeze out of the train’s windows and onto the platform where the train had made an emergency stop.
“I thought it was a Halloween stunt,” one witness told the a local newspaper, recalling the moment he saw other passengers running in a panic towards his train car. “Then, I saw a man walking this way, slowly waving a long knife.” There was blood on the knife, he said.
🚨 | NEW: The alleged attacker in Japan, in a “Joker” costume. Sitting and casually smoking after stabbing and spraying hydrochloric acid on passengers on a train in Tokyo, and then setting everything on fire
— News For All (@NewsForAllUK) October 31, 2021
Another video on Twitter showed a bespectacled man dressed in a purple suit and bright green shirt, as worn by the Joker, seated in an empty train puffing on a cigarette, his legs crossed and looking calm. He can be seen through the window being surrounded by law enforcement in a subsequent clip.
Local media reported later that the suspect told authorities he “wanted to kill people so he could be sentenced to death”. The attack occurred on the Keio express line bound for Shinjuku, the world’s busiest rail station, at around 8PM (1100 GMT), media said.
Partial service on the Keio line remained suspended late on Sunday, when Japanese voters went to the polls in a lower house election. The attack was the second involving a knife on a Tokyo train in two months.
