NAGOYA -- A Filipino man plunged five stories from his friend's apartment here to his death Monday rather than be arrested for not having a valid visa, police said.
Franco Juan Paul, a 39-year-old Filipino national, jumped from the fifth floor balcony of his friend's Higashi-ku apartment as police officers waited outside in the belief he was picking up his passport.
Officers said they let Paul go into the apartment alone because they did not have a warrant to enter and he was cooperating with them voluntarily.
Hidenori Sekiya, deputy chief of the Naka Police Station, defended police actions.
"They acted appropriately considering that he was being interviewed on a voluntary basis. It's regrettable that things had to come to an end like this," Sekiya said.
Police said three officers in Naka-ku on Monday morning asked a foreigner riding his bicycle to stop for questioning, but he cycled off so the officers chased after him. When they caught him, they asked for his passport.
The man told them his passport was in his apartment and two officers accompanied him to the Naka-ku apartment where he said the document was, with the policemen waiting outside while he retrieved it, police said. The man did not come out for a while, so police opened the apartment door, but could not find him.
Police said they noticed he had collapsed on the ground about 14 meters below the apartment balcony. He was confirmed dead shortly afterward.
Police said Paul had been living in Japan without a valid visa since May 2003.
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