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A Mother who Abandoned Her Children to Starve to Death
A sex worker who fought for custody of her two children during her divorce only to become tired of caring for them
The Osaka child abandonment case involved two abandoned children in Osaka, Japan. It happened in late June 2010 when Sanae Shimomura, a 23-year-old Japanese single mother living in Osaka, closed the door to her apartment shut, leaving her 3-year-old daughter Sakurako Hagi and 1-year-old son Kaede Hagi alone inside with no way out.
Sanae Shimomura was the mother of two adorable children: Sakurako Hagi, a sweet girl, and Kaede Hagi, a charming little boy. Since her divorce in May 2009, she has been responsible for raising her children alone, a position she clearly can’t bear. She didn’t have the time or energy to do the cleaning, as evidenced by the mountain of garbage piled up in the apartment.
Sanae Shimomura, who was 23, began working in a sex parlor in January 2010. She was a beautiful young woman, and the job provided a nice break from her daily responsibilities as a wife and a mother. Her employer provided her with an apartment in which she currently resides.
Sanae Shimomura began dating someone in March 2010 and began spending her nights with him, leaving her three-year-old daughter and one-year-old son alone at home. How could a moral person, let alone a mother, walk away from two innocent children and leave them alone for hours at that time.
The children could be heard wailing and yelling “mama, mama!” every night. Because of that, a concerned neighbor reached out to the Osaka municipal child consultation center on three separate occasions.
On March 30, 2010, the first phone call was made. On March 31, April 1, and April 2, two welfare authorities arrived at the location. They were unable to get anyone to answer the door, so…
