[1] According to writer and activist Jakucho Setouchi, Itō, Ōsugi, and his 6-year-old nephew were arrested, beaten to death, and thrown into an abandoned well by a squad of military police led by Lieutenant Masahiko Amakasu.

[3] Both accounts agree that both or all of the prisoners were brutally executed without a trial, where convictions and death sentences for the two adults would have been almost guaranteed.

The historian John Crump argued that "once again, the most able anarchist of his generation had been murdered," echoing the execution of Kōtoku Shūsui in the High Treason Incident just twelve years prior.

The murders drew attention in the United States, since the child was a dual-national with American citizenship, having been born in Portland, Oregon.

[5] During the trial, Amakasu's lawyers tied the murder to soldierly duties, and the ideals of spontaneity, sincerity, and pure motives.

They argued that Sakae and Noe were traitors, and Amakasu killed them out of an irresistible urge to protect his country.