Mental home worker used wild dogs to terrorize patients

A care worker from a notorious mental home here used to unleash feral dogs in the facility so that he could terrorize patients and ease his workload, sources told the Mainichi newspaper in Japan.

Shigemi Sudo, the care worker who has already been arrested for assaulting patients at the infamous Caritas no Ie mental home, is also accused of allowing the feral dogs to bite some patients' legs and buttocks.

Home officials are alleged to have been informed of Sudo's purported activities, but refused to take action against him.

Several sources have attested to the claims.

"It causes a lot of work for officials if patients get out of their rooms and start to panic, so Sudo seems to have used the dogs like watchdogs that would keep the patients from leaving their rooms," a former Caritas no Ie official told the Mainichi on condition of anonymity.

Several sources said that starting about five years ago, three feral dogs roamed around outside the grounds of the mental home. Sudo, 54, befriended the dogs, feeding them and giving them attention.

About three years ago, the sources allege, Sudo started bringing the dogs into the home when he was on duty.

Sudo did not keep the wild dogs on a leash. There were several reported instances from January to March last year when the feral dogs bit patients.

Patients were terrified of Sudo and his dogs, the sources said. When Sudo was on duty, patients would typically shut themselves up in their rooms and not come out.

Sudo knew which patients were most frightened by the feral dogs. When he approached these patients, there were times when he would deliberately make the dogs go closer to the terrified patient, the sources said.

When a patient was late at mealtime, Sudo would confiscate their meal and feed it to his dogs, the sources said.

Guardians of some patients learned of what Sudo had allegedly been doing and complained to Caritas no Ie operators. Operators did not deny the allegations, but said they could not punish Sudo because if he were fired they would not be able to find anybody else to perform his duties. (Mainichi)