Police in Sakai, Osaka Prefecture, have arrested a 24-year-old man on suspicion of fatally abusing his seven-month-old daughter in May.

According to police, Ryo Shinohara, a part-time worker, is accused of choking his daughter Ema to death in the bathroom at around 9:30 p.m. on May 19, Sankei Shimbun reported. Police said Shinohara has denied the charge and quoted him as saying he only pressed his daughter’s neck with his thumb and forefinger because she wouldn’t stop crying, but that she was alive.

Police said Shinohara told them Ema was sitting on a bathmat while he rinsed her hair when she suddenly felt unwell and slumped. He called out to his wife in another room and she called 119.

Ema was rushed to hospital where she died. Doctors said she died of asphyxiation after having been choked.

© Japan Today