She Killed Her Friend Then Mailed Her in a Box Labeled “Doll”

The gruesome story of identity theft and murder.

As you get older, life gets busier and more complicated. With work, family, hobbies, and other parts of life taking center stage, friends seem to fade away. Many people lose contact with those they grew up with and friends from school or camp are just passing Instagram photos or Facebook updates. But then once in a while, a person who you haven’t seen or heard from in years reaches out.

And unlike strangers online who might be sexual predators, identity thieves, or even violent criminals out looking for victims, this person is a past friend who you know personally. So it’s easy to let your guard down. Which is exactly what Rika Okada, a nurse in Osaka, did when she agreed to reconnect with her elementary and junior highschool friend Yuri Oishi.

Unfortunately, the meeting with Yuri ended up being her biggest mistake. Not only did Yuri steal Rika’s identity, but she also murdered her and fled the country. Why did Yuri target Rika? How did she kill her? How did she get caught and what happened to her? This is the story of a friend who reached out via social media to find and kill her friend.

Yuri’s Desperation

Yuri was born in Brazil but was of Japanese descent. In the early 1900s after slavery was banned in Brazil, the country needed people to work in the coffee plantations. However, because of poor working conditions and low wages, most Europeans would not come to Brazil. Japanese people in need of economic survival could not go to America or Australia because of laws banning non-whites, so they came to Brazil to work in the plantations.

Yuri’s family returned to Japan from Brazil when she was a child and she lived in the Nishinari Ward of Osaka close to Rika. They went to the same elementary school and junior high school and were friends. But in high school, Yuri decided to move back to Brazil and attend high school there. Japan only allows one citizenship so Yuri had to decide between Japan and Brazil by age 18. During this time in Brazil, she decided to become a Brazilian citizen.

Returning to Japan once again when she was 20 years old, she realized it was hard to find a good job and be part of Japanese society once she had given up her Japanese citizenship. She was on a temporary visa, couldn’t find a well-paying job, and ended up working at supermarkets and convenience stores to get by. She also lived with a Chinese roommate in Hachioji, Tokyo to save money.

Yuri was isolated as she had been on bad terms with her father and they hadn’t contacted each other in three years. With no family or real friends, her only friend was her Chinese roommate. But in 2013, her roommate was planning to return to China after getting a job offer to work for a Japanese company in Shanghai. That’s when Yuri decided she wanted to go to China as well.

Yuri later told police, “I was feeling lonely and I wanted to go to study advertising and get a job in advertising in China.” However, Yuri was in debt, couldn’t afford to go to China, and had been denied permanent residency in Japan so had overstayed her visa and was living in Japan illegally.

She had heard on the news of other foreigners who had forged their passports and decided since she couldn’t leave Japan legitimately, so she would try to forge her own. She started thinking of ways to get out of the country, and that is when she reached out to Rika.

Reconnecting With Rika

Doing some research on passport forgery and leaving Japan, she realized that she needed to either steal a passport or make one illegally. However, stealing a passport would probably get her caught, and forging on would also cost a lot of money and be risky. Instead, she started scouring her Facebook for friends, a female, around her own age.

She needed someone who was single and would be easy to target as well as someone who had never left Japan and didn’t have a passport. After reviewing her choices, she decided to target Rika. Rika lived alone as a nurse, didn’t have a passport, and lived in Osaka.

Using LINE, which is a messaging app similar to WhatsApp, Yuri reached out to Rika in January of 2014 and told her she was back in Japan. It had been ten years since they met and since Yuri was going to be in Osaka, she asked if she wanted to meet for dinner.

Rika, who was pleasantly shocked to receive a message, agreed and Rika, Yuri, and two other former classmates got together at a local izakaya, which is a Japanese pub.

On February 1st, 2014, Rika posted a message on her Facebook, “I’m going to meet my elementary school classmates this evening. Has it been 10 years since we last met?” After the meeting, Rika also posted a picture of the four at the izakaya on her Facebook.

While at the dinner, Yuri later admitted she started thinking she would kill Rika but hadn’t planned any of the details out yet. She spent the night at Rika’s home then went back to Tokyo the next day. Back in Tokyo, Yuri’s Chinese roommate was getting ready to leave Japan and left mid-March leaving Yuri alone. Yuri decided it was time to start planning her exit out of Japan as well.

The Crime

On March 20, 2014, weeks after Yuri’s visit, Rika posted a Facebook update saying, “I just had a very unpleasant experience and I am shaking with anger.” What was the source of anger is unknown but it might have been learning that Yuri was back in Osaka and wanted to stay with Rika.

The next day on March 21st, Yuri, who might have been angered by Rika’s update, confirmed her intentions to kill Rika by buying a knife at a home improvement store and heading to Rika’s home. Uninvited, she forced herself into Rika’s home and refused to leave. Rika, who had been described as quiet and polite by most of her friends, most likely couldn’t refuse and allowed Yuri to spend the night.

On the morning of March 22nd, Rika sent a LINE message to her friend saying, “Yuri just showed up at my place last night and she refuses to leave.” Rika decided to confront Yuri one more time in hopes that she would leave.

Yuri had her knife out of her bag and had it close to her and waited until morning. She told police she was growing impatient and once Rika told Yuri to get out of her home, Yuri stabbed her in the stomach. Yuri told the police, “I don’t remember what happened after that but I stabbed her over and over again.” It would later be determined that Rika was stabbed over 50 times.

Yuri then cleaned up the blood from Rika’s body, wiped the knife, and tried to remove any trace of her crime from Rika’s home. She also cleaned up any online trace by deleting the post about Rika’s anger. Then sending a text from Rika’s phone to her work saying she was sick and wouldn’t be coming to work.

The rest of the day, there were no Facebook updates or messages from Rika’s phone. As Rika was a good cook and would often post photos of her cooking, no activity was considered strange by those who knew her. She was quite social online and none of her friends could reach her via social media or phone as it was shut off.

When Rika’s parents would send messages, Yuri would reply as Rika hoping to prolong anyone knowing that Rika was missing. When someone from Rika’s work did a home visit, they reported no one was home. And when the building landlord called, Yuri called back pretending to be Rika and told them she was really far away and wouldn’t be back for a while.

Rika’s parents reported Rika missing at the end of March when she didn’t show up for work and couldn’t be reached via phone.

Hiding Rika

After using Rika’s phone to call in sick, Yuri turned off Rika’s phone, stole her bag with wallet and credit cards, and on March 23rd, called a moving company to pick up a “package” from Rika’s home. The caller said she was Rika and also used Rika’s credit card to pay for the delivery. Later police would find that Yuri signed the delivery slip as Rika but used her own cell phone number as the contact.

According to reports, Yuri drained as much blood as she could, wrapped Rika’s body in soft bubble wrap, and placed it in a cardboard box about 2 meters or 6 feet long. The package weighed about 50 kg or 110 lbs.

The contents were labeled as a life-size doll made of clay and it was addressed to Rika but with Yuri’s Tokyo address. The label said, “handle with care, life-size replica human doll.” Police later found Yuri’s fingerprints on the box.

Yuri left Rika’s apartment and went home to Tokyo to receive the package which was delivered a day later. After hiding the body in her apartment for a month, she then rented a storage locker paid using Rika’s credit card near her home, and moved Rika’s body there in late April. Along with Rika’s wallet and phone, Yuri decided to apply for more credit cards. She also used her health card to get the certificate needed to apply for a passport.

She then used a photo of herself and made a passport in the name of Rika. It was later reported that she spent over one million yen (about 10 thousand dollars) both in Japan and in Shanghai on hotels, clothes, and other goods.

Yuri’s Capture

Yuri most likely moved Rika’s body into the storage locker so her roommate who was in China would not return and find it. Once the roommate returned, Yuri decided that she would accompany her roommate to China the next time she went. She purchased a plane ticket using a credit card in Rika’s name and along with her friend headed to China.

On May 3, she took a flight from Tokyo to Shanghai but was stopped by Shanghai officials and detained for suspected illegal entry into China. She said she was given consent by Rika to use the passport but then turned herself into the Japanese consulate and was held by the authorities.

Meanwhile back in Osaka, as the disappearance of Rika was being investigated, the police not only found bloodstains with the DNA matching Rika in her apartment but were able to trace the body and found Rika’s corpse in the storage locker. Using fingerprint analysis as well as other evidence, police quickly linked Rika’s murder to Yuri.

There was a warrant out for Yuri for the robbery and use of Rika’s credit cards as well for the murder of Rika Okada. However, there is no extradition treaty between Japan and China so the Osaka police using diplomatic channels requested China to hand Yuri over to Japan.

Unfortunately, Yuri, who gave up Japanese citizenship was originally going to be sent back to Brazil, where she is a citizen. But the Japanese government continued to plead for Yuri to be sent back to Japan and finally in 2016 China’s Supreme Court ruled Yuri should be sent back to Japan.

In January 2017 Yuri was brought back to Osaka and was arrested for theft, and the murder of Rika Okada as well as fraud for creating credit cards and a passport in Rika’s name. Originally, Yuri refused to cooperate with the police and said she had, “nothing to say,” but she later confessed to the robbery and murder of Rika.

Sentencing

The trial for Yuri began in 2019 and Yuri admitted to killing Rika but her defense team claimed she suffered from a psychological illness. Her lawyers argued that she should be punished but should not be held “fully criminally liable due to diminished mental capacity.”

However, prosecutors pointed out that many steps were taken to hide the body, including packaging it, transporting it, and then hiding it in a storage locker. Many actions including preventing the discovery of the crime by sending messages from Rika’s phone and impersonating Rika to avoid detection showed that Yuri had the ability to judge good and bad behavior.

Yuri was sentenced to life in prison in March of 2019 but appealed the decision. Higher courts also decided to uphold the sentence and the Supreme Court dismissed her appeal finalizing her life sentence.

After the trial and sentencing, Yuri in tears made a statement saying, “I am sorry. I am sad and sorry for my actions and for causing so much trouble to so many people.”

Despite her apology and feelings of remorse, a young nurse was killed and her identity stolen by someone who was desperate and alone. Had she had more support from her family or from the government, things might have turned out differently.

Being Japanese but having a Brazilian passport made her feel inferior and robbed her of opportunities that official Japanese people have in Japan. This led her to feel trapped and cornered and in the end made her a murderer.

Unfortunately, rather than reaching out to friends in a positive way and trying to find a way to better her life, she decided to take advantage of them. Using the guise of friendship she used social media to lure her victim and take advantage.

If you liked this article, check out these stories of true crime from Japan: