Shoko Asahara (麻原 彰晃 "Asahara Shōkō") (born Chizuo Matsumoto on March 2, 1955) is the founder of Japan's controversial Buddhist religious group Aum Shinrikyo (now known as Aleph). Asahara has been convicted of masterminding the 1995 Sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway and several other crimes, and has been sentenced to death. His legal team appealed the sentence, but the appeal has been declined, and he is currently awaiting execution. Wikipedia
The definitive Wikipedia entry for Shoko Asahara. Wikipedia is the biggest multilingual free-content encyclopedia on the Internet. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoko_Asahara
The Aum Supreme Truth is a terrorist organization based in Japan, responsible for a Sarin gas attack in Tokyo www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/terrorists/prophet/...
The cult's founder and leader, Shoko Asahara, and most of the group's high-ranking members were indicted for murder and other crimes. www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?ff20020327a1.htm
Later it was learned that this was not the first violent act of the cult. In 1989 Aum's leader Shoko Asahara ordered the abduction and murder of an anti Aum lawyer, his wife and infant son. Less than a year before the Tokyo gas attack (June 1994) Aum me www.culteducation.com/asahara.html
In the early 1980s he joined Agonshu, a 'new age' group. In 1987 he claimed to have experienced a revelation while in India. He also claimed to have found that he had unique DNA. He changed his name to Asahara Shoko and formed his own group Aum Shinrik www.japan-101.com/culture/shoko_asahara.htm
