Sensational crimes are defined by the media since sensations fuel the media engine. Murder has the greatest potential for sensationalism, but some murders attract more attention than others. Through a certain confluence of motive, money, and methodology some hog headlines for weeks while others never make it past the police blotter.
Once a crime becomes a sensation it usually remains somewhere on the media's radar until a verdict is reached, which is why the so-called "lesser panda-cap case" rates special attention.
On April 30, 2001, a large man wearing a cap with the face of lesser panda on it dragged a 19-year-old woman into a side street in the Asakusa district of Tokyo and stabbed her to death as she screamed for help. The man escaped and the media went over the case in detail, describing it as a deviant sex crime while thousands of citizens bombarded the police with information of possible sightings of the suspect. Eventually, he was caught and the story immediately died.