child sexual abuse. Kinoshita's murder had attracted attention from the Japanese mass media, and her real name was reported before it was revealed that she had been sexually assaulted. On June 26, 2006, her father Kenichi said: Airi is not 'a Hiroshima first-grader'. She lived here. It is all right to use her name., after which the media resumed reporting her real name. On July 4, 2006, the Hiroshima District Court sentenced Torres to life imprisonment for sexually assaulting and killing the girl, citing his haphazardness. He had dumped the girl's body close to his apartment. Prosecutors appealed against the leniency of the sentence, demanding the death penalty. On December 9, 2008, the Hiroshima High Court reversed and remanded the original verdict. However, the Supreme Court of Japan demanded that they continue his trial. The Hiroshima High Court upheld the life sentence, resulting in the end of his trial because they had not submitted an additional appeal by August 12, 2010. Reaction Kinoshita's death caused a moral panic among parents in Japan, which had been thought to be a "safe society", and led to greater suspicion against otaku subculture in the country. The Japanese media had suspected that the criminal was an otaku while Kinoshita's murder was still being investigated, though Torres' arrest and conviction proved this to be false. The panic against otaku had existed in Japan since the arrest of Tsutomu Miyazaki in Tokyo in 1989, and was heightened by the arrest of Kaoru Kobayashi in Osaka a year earlier. Similar to Torres, both Miyazaki and Kobayashi had raped and murdered young girls around Kinoshita's age and were well-publicized as otaku, although there was little evidence of them being otaku. Torres' charges of child sexual abuse in Peru meant the incident also had influence in Latin America. A journalist, Kent Paterson, indicated Torres into debates of femicides in Latin America. See also Kaoru Kobayashi Tsutomu Miyazaki References External links Japan to probe foreigners' crimes BBC, December 2, 2005 Peruvian Man Admits Killing Japanese Girl CBS, December 1, 2005 Grief, outrage pour forthat slain schoolgirl's funeral The Japan Times, November 26, 2005 Hiroshima murder suspect had poor life, broken home in Peru The Japan Times, December 20, 2005 Slain girl's dad wants details of crime reported The Japan Times, June 27, 2006 Femicide On the Rise in Latin America Americas Program, March 8, 2006 Report on the murder Taipei