A Japanese hacker who hijacked computers in order to issue death threats, leading to the arrest of several innocent people, was jailed on Wednesday after a game of cat and mouse with police.

Yusuke Katayama, 32, used computers to make a series of threats in 2012, including that he would kill people at a comic book event, attack an airplane and target a kindergarten attended by the grandchildren of Emperor Akihito.

"He committed the crime, and the purpose of it was for police to make wrongful arrests," said Katsunori Ohno, presiding judge at Tokyo District Court, adding that Katayama's actions had been "vicious".