Japanese pensioner sent to hospital after Tube horror

A Japanese pensioner who tried to kill a stranger by pushing her in front of an oncoming Tube train has been locked up in a mental hospital.

Yoshiyuki Shinohara, 82, waited at the busy Bakerloo Line platform at Piccadilly Circus for nearly 45 minutes before attacking Sheetal Kerai, 32.

Ms Kerai hit the front carriage of the train and was lucky to escape with cuts and bruises when she bounced backwards on the platform, Blackfriars Crown Court.

Shinohara was arrested on the afternoon of 10 November last year but had been found unfit to plead to a charge of attempted murder.

Robert Evans, prosecuting, said: ‘It is only down to Mrs Kerai’s position – a safe distance behind the yellow line – his distance from her and his misjudgement about the speed of the train which saved her life.

He added: ‘There is no evidence to suggest that they knew each other beforehand.

‘After he did it, he just stood there and waited for the police.’

A witness commuter, David Wright, who saw the attack on the northbound had told the court it was a deliberate attack.

‘At this time, I saw him step forward with both hands up, palms outstretched, and push the female strongly in the back.

‘At this point the train was just entering the platform and I genuinely thought she was going to go in front of the train and be hit by it.

‘The push, in my view, was deliberate.’

Mr Wright then described the man standing with his back to the wall with his fists raised.

‘I interpreted this as the male knew what he had done and wanted to be arrested,’ added Mr Wright.

A jury of nine women and three men found Shinohara guilty of attempted murder earlier this year, and today (FRI) Judge John Hillen handed ordered that he be detained in hospital.

He said: ‘The train approached in the tunnel, and the defendant slipped out of the slippers he was wearing and using both hands pushed her with force towards the train.

‘Fortunately the action was sufficiently late for her to not go in front of the tracks, instead hitting the front carriage, being thrown back and receiving cuts and bruises.

‘It is a Londoner’s and a tourist’s greatest fear that someone might be motivated to do something aggressive to them on the platform.

‘I have no doubt that transport for London will continue to consider the safety of passengers.’

Addressing Shinohara directly, Judge Hillen said: ‘You suffer from a mental illness, namely paranoid schizophrenia.

‘It is therefore that you are to be detained in a medical hospital.’

Shinohara, who was accompanied in the dock by three nurses and an interpreter stared blankly as he was led away.

Shinohara, whose registered address was given as Ibis Hotel, (112) Bath Road, Heathrow,
will only be released when the doctors agree he no longer poses a risk to the public.