Police search house of man linked to fire that killed 24 in Osaka building

Witnesses told Japanese media a man walked into the clinic in central Osaka, carrying a paper bag, which he put on the floor, next to a heater by the reception desk, and kicked it

Investigators enter into a building where a fire broke out in Osaka, western Japan Saturday, Dec. 18, 2021. A fire that spread from a fourth-floor mental clinic in the eight-story building in downtown Osaka on Friday left more than 20 dead in what police were investigating as a possible case of arson and murder. (Yukie Nishizawa/Kyodo News via AP)

Japanese police have searched the house of one of the patients at a mental clinic where a fire gutted an entire floor in an eight-storey building, killing 24 people trapped inside.

An Osaka police investigator told the Associated Press the man is a possible suspect.