Japan ‘serial killer’ said to be quiet child turned sex trade scout

Suspect Takahiro Shiraishi (centre) covers his face with his hands as he is transported to the prosecutor's office from a police station in Tokyo on November 1, 2017. -AFP

TOKYO: Takahiro Shiraishi, the Japanese man who has reportedly confessed to murdering and hacking up nine young people in his Tokyo bathroom, was said to be a quiet schoolboy who would grow up to work on the fringes of the sex industry and become a suspected serial killer.

Pictures of the 27-year-old show an ordinary-looking man with neat, dark hair and glasses, who lived in a nondescript flat on a quiet residential street in one of Tokyo’s endless sprawling suburbs.