SAPPORO -- A deer caught in a wire snare in Niseko, Hokkaido, is suspected to have fatally pierced a local farmer in the chest with its antlers.

At around noon on Nov. 23, a woman found her husband, 76-year-old Kazumi Sasaki, collapsed and bleeding from his chest, and called an ambulance. He had a wound that appeared to have been caused by a puncture, and was pronounced dead at the hospital.

There was a male deer with antlers near the scene whose leg was caught in a wire snare, and Hokkaido Prefectural Police's Kutchan Police Station is investigating with the view that he might have been attacked by the deer.

According to the police station, Sasaki went out at around 10 a.m. that day to check on a deer trap he had set near his home. Wondering why he had not returned for a long time, his wife went out to check on him, and found him lying on the ground. The deer found caught in the trap was still moving around.

(Japanese original by Takumi Taniguchi, Hokkaido News Department)