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The Keio Plaza Hotel in Shinjuku, Tokyo, where 21-year-old Nicola Furlong was discovered on Thursday morning. davinelulinvega via Flickr
Japan

Two American men arrested following Tokyo death of Irish student

Local reports say two American men have been arrested in Japan, and that Nicola Furlong, 21, died of suffocation.

TWO AMERICAN MAN have been arrested by police in Tokyo in connection with the suspicious death of an exchange student from Dublin City University who died in the city on Thursday morning.

Japan’s Kyodo news agency reports that the men are aged 19 and 23; and that Nicola Furlong, 21, had been staying in the 19-year-old’s hotel room on the night she died.

AFP quoted Kyodo as saying the two were detained on suspicion of giving alcohol drinks to another 21-year-old Irish woman who was with Furlong on the night, while CNN said they were also questioned on suspicion of ‘improperly touching’ the second woman.

Neither man has so far been charged specifically in relation to the death of Furlong, a third-year DCU student originally from Curracloe in Co Wicklow.

The Irish women had reportedly missed a train home following a concert by Trinidadian-born rapper Nicki Minaj. Furlong had been studying at a university in Takasaki city, around an hour away.

Kyodo said the two were approached by the two American men in the train station, and the four had travelled to the Keio Plaza Hotel in Shinjuku, where a hotel guest had complained about a loud noise coming from one room in the early hours of Thursday morning.

Its report said a hotel employee had then gone to the room to find Furlong lying on the floor with the 19-year-old American standing nearby.

CNN cited local police as saying Nicole had suffocated, and described the 19-year-old as a musician and the 23-year-old as a dancer. It was not clear whether they were part of Minaj’s touring entourage.

Read: DCU student found dead in Tokyo hotel room after concert

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