Man sought in teacher's slaying nabbed

OSAKA, Japan, Nov. 10 (UPI) -- Japanese police in Osaka say they have arrested the man wanted in the 2007 slaying of British teacher Lindsay Ann Hawker.

Tatsuya Ichihashi, 30, was arrested Tuesday at a ferry terminal in Osaka, Japan, 2 1/2 years after Hawker's body was found on a balcony in his Ichikawa, Japan, apartment, Mainichi Shimbun reported.

The newspaper said a tipster at the Osaka Nanko Ferry Terminal phoned police to report a suspicious man resembling Ichihashi. Officers rushed to the scene and questioned the man, who reportedly admitted he was the fugitive. NHK television reported that he was wearing a cap, sunglasses and a mask.

The 22-year-old victim's father, Bill Hawker, told Japan's TBS News, "My nightmare is finally over. I'm now going to contact my wife and my two daughters to tell them this good news, and I very much look forward to seeing Ichihashi across a courtroom so I can look him in the face."

Kyodo News said Ichihashi underwent plastic surgery at a clinic in Nagoya, after which police released a photograph of his post-surgery face in which he had obtained double-fold eyelids, a higher nose bridge and thinner lips.