| “ | I could not believe he had the desire to commit a crime like this, probably because he was playing too much Call of Duty. If he succeeded, then my whole career would be flame broiled into oblivion as I would end up taking Susumu's position and I'm not an expert at business. Our eldest son Minoru isn't old enough to become the CEO of Drillimation, he's only eight. | „ |
| ~ Kagami Ochiai, in an interview with Kotaku |
On June 11, 2013, an attempt to assassinate Susumu Takajima was plotted. While Takajima was speaking at the Drillimation booth at E3 2013 in Los Angeles, California, the perpetrator pulled out a gun and tried to shoot Susumu Takajima but failed and was subdued five minutes after he fired the first shot. No fatalities were reported, but the Los Angeles Convention Center had to strengthen their security to prevent future incidents like this from occurring. The assassination attempt had caused a scare on internet communities, including imageboards such as 4chan, and was even the subject of a PBS Frontline documentary.
The perpetrator, who was a 25-year-old Libyan who immigrated to the US with his family, was part of Team Crimson and was accused of disrupting a speech and was charged with attempted murder and possession of a firearm at a convention. The perpetrator had a long history of mentality disorders and he plotted to kill Takajima to stop him from trying to release Lucky Star: Lords of Shadow 2. On June 18, 2013, the Crimsonite plead guilty to both charges and was sentenced to two years in prison. He was released in 2015.
History[]
Assassination attempt[]
On the first day of E3 2013, Takajima announced to the public that Drillimation was preparing to release Lucky Star: Lords of Shadow 2 in Q1 2014. The Crimsonite was not happy about this, and within minutes, he pulled out a gun and fired a shot at Takajima's podium. Minor damage was inflicted to the podium, but Takajima was not injured. Takajima's wife, Kagami Ochiai, and programmer Kenjirou Nasaya escorted him to safety.
The Crimsonite had been planning to murder Takajima for almost a year, as early as Fall 2012. When the Crimsonite learned that Takajima would be at E3 that year, he immediately purchased tickets to the event. He also held tickets to the upcoming Anime Weekend Atlanta convention in Atlanta, Georgia that Takajima was planning to appear at if he did not get a chance to kill Takajima there in Los Angeles.
Aftermath[]
Five hours after the incident happened, all SBC networks in the Island of Sally except kids' channels interrupted their transmission to show the news at exactly 23:10:51 Sallyish Time.
After the perpetrator was arrested, he was tried for his trial the week after the assassination attempt. He pleaded guilty to both charges and was sentenced to two years at a prison in Los Angeles. He was released in June 2015. Takajima had a mental breakdown on the night after the shooting and had to be sectioned at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center for a few days after E3 before returning to Japan.
Frontline documentary[]
Drillimation commissioned PBS to do a documentary on this horrifying event called Mysteries of the Real Team Crimson: The One Who Tried to Kill The Real Driller.
Trivia[]
- Here's a list of notable things on the SBC channels interrupted by the news broadcast.
- On SBC1, a documentary about the making of Baby Alive.
- On SBC2, a Sofia the First promo for the show's terrestrial premiere (it had already been airing on Disney Channel's Playhouse Disney since March)
Gallery[]
