In an incident earlier this week, a 15 year old boy allegedly murdered his parents by battering and slashing them to death, and tired to cover up their murder by blowing up their Tokyo apartment using home-made explosives.

According to Tokyo police, the boy admitted to his crimes when confronted, and was reported as saying “I wanted to kill my father since he made a fool out of me. I decided to kill my mother as well, since she was always saying that she wanted to die because of all the work she had to do. I felt sorry for her.”

The Japanese media is blaming the wildly popular Grand Theft Auto series for this boy’s action. The link to the game is apparently from a schoolmate, who described him as an average kid who loved playing video games, especially Grand Theft Auto 3.

OK, I know that this really isn’t something that I should be posting, but with the recent onslaught against videogames in general, I think I need to comment on this:

Yes, GTA3 is an extremely violent game, but just look at this kids reported statement to police: he killed his father because he made a fool of him, and he killed his mother because she said she wanted to kill herself.

Don’t put the onus on GTA3, or violent video games in general. That family had some serious mental issues that needed to be worked out, but, unfortunately, never were.