--- description: Japanese police today arrested the security chief of thecultsuspected inlast month's nerve gas attackon the Tokyo subway system that killed 11 people. Tomomitsu Niimi, 31,... title: TOP CULT MEMBER ARRESTED image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- * [U.S.](/section/us/) # TOP CULT MEMBER ARRESTED by [TIME](/author/time/) Apr 12, 1995 4:00 AM CUT by [TIME](/author/time/) Apr 12, 1995 4:00 AM CUT Japanese police today arrested the security chief of the[cult](../../../magazine/domestic/1995/950410/950410.japan.html "undefined")suspected in[last month’s nerve gas attack](../../../magazine/domestic/1995/950403/950403.cover.html "undefined")on the Tokyo subway system that killed 11 people. Tomomitsu Niimi, 31, was charged with kidnapping a 29-year-old woman who says he drugged her and kept her in a freight container for three months because she was trying to leave the Aum Shinrikyo cult. In a Moscow court yesterday, a teenager who once belonged to the cult said the sect had tested nerve gas on its Russian followers. TOP CULT MEMBER ARRESTED ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/archive/6923939/top-cult-member-arrested/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/archive/6923939/top-cult-member-arrested/"},"headline":"TOP CULT MEMBER ARRESTED","datePublished":"1995-04-12T04:00:00.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-22T22:44:30.471Z","description":"Japanese police today arrested the security chief of thecultsuspected inlast month's nerve gas attackon the Tokyo subway system that killed 11 people. Tomomitsu Niimi, 31,...","url":"https://time.com/archive/6923939/top-cult-member-arrested/","keywords":[],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME","url":"https://time.com/author/time/"}],"articleSection":"U.S.","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/us/","name":"U.S."}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/archive/6923939/top-cult-member-arrested/","name":"TOP CULT MEMBER ARRESTED"}}]}] ```