TOKYO, Japan -- Japanese police said Monday they have found parts of a dismembered body believed to be of a missing woman in the mountains of western Japan, in a murder case reportedly linked to an American tourist.
Hyogo prefectural police said investigators found a torso, arms and legs in three locations in parts of Kyoto and Osaka on Sunday.
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Police said the parts could be from the body of an unidentified woman who has been missing in the prefecture since mid-February. Local media said the woman was a 27-year-old office worker from Sanda City.
Police suggested that they searched the locations after being told about them by a suspect, but refused to elaborate. An examination of the body parts is being conducted to identify the victim, they said.
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Kyodo News service and other Japanese media reported that police arrested a 26-year-old New Yorker as a suspect, but police would not confirm that. The reports said police also found the severed head of a woman inside a suitcase at his lodging in Osaka.
The reports said security camera video from the building showed him entering with a woman, but did not show the woman leaving. It showed the suspect going in and out with a suitcase, they said.