was a Japanese screenwriter and mystery novelist. He won the Kuniko Mukà Âda Prize in 1998 for his screenplays Nemureru Mori (A Sleeping Forest) and Kekkon Zen'ya (The Night before the Wedding). He also won the Edogawa Rampo Prize in 1997 for Hasen no marisu (Dotted-line Malice) and the Eiji Yoshikawa Prize for New Writers in 2001 for Shinku (Crimson). The South Korean TV Network SBS broadcast a 16-episode drama Alone in Love adapted from one of his novels in 2006. He also wrote the animated film '.
He was found dead in his office in Tokyo's Meguro ward, after he had apparently hanged himself several days earlier. A note was also found at the scene.