US Marine indicted for robbing and murdering Japanese woman in Okinawa

A US marine has been indicted in Okinawa prefecture in Japan on charges of robbing and murdering a Japanese woman.

Lance corporal Devin Jacob Ballard, 20, was accused of killing Anna Yagi, 39 , in a hotel in the prefecture 's capital Naha and taking her wallet and backpack earlier this month. Ballard denied the allegations.

Ballard, who was stationed at Futenma Air Base, was found walking alone in Okinawa city later that day and was arrested the following day on suspicion of robbery and murder.

He was indicted on Sunday amid growing anger among Okinawa residents over the incident and the presence of US military installations.

He allegedly strangled the woman with the cord of a telephone in a hotel room between 2.10 and 4.15am on 3 October and stole her backpack that contained her wallet and other belongings, according to the indictment.

The woman had checked into the hotel with a man around 2.10am that day. Hotel employees entered the room at 4.15am after she did not check out on time. The staff found her body and alerted the police, investigative sources told the Japan Times .

Investigators later checked the security footage that showed a man with tattoos on both arms and a backpack leading the hotel, the report said. The backpack was found near the hotel.

Under Japanese law, conviction can carry the death penalty or life imprisonment.

The incident involving a foreign national prompted Okinawa governor Genta Koja to step up calls for the central government to take preventive measures.

Local residents have long voiced anger over crimes committed by US military personnel, including offences against women and girls, as well as noise and pollution associated with American military installations.

Following his arrest, the US military in Okinawa imposed a 30-day curfew on 9 October, restricting personnel from leaving their bases between midnight and 5 am.

It was after the Japanese government lodged a strong protest with the US government over the incident.

Prime minister Sanae Takaichi condemned the incident as a "brutal and heinous" crime and called for stricter discipline of American personnel.

The incident renewed long-standing local tensions over the heavy US military presence on Okinawa, which hosts a large share of US bases in Japan.

Crimes involving US military personnel stationed in Japan, including murder, rape, and robbery, have long been a source of public concern.

In Okinawa, local police handled over 100 criminal cases involving US personnel in 2025 alone, according to an official from the prefecture.

In 2016, a former Marine and Kadena base civilian worker Kenneth Gadson was sentenced to life in prison for raping and murdering a 20-year-old woman.

The rape of a ​12-year-old Okinawan ⁠girl by three US servicemen in 1995 sparked widespread protests.