TOKYO (AP) — Tokyo police say they have arrested a man after finding "multiple" dismembered bodies in coolers in his apartment in a city southwest of the capital.

A police spokesman said Tuesday the 27-year-old suspect confessed to cutting up the bodies and hiding them in cold-storage cases, covered with cat litter.

The official did not give his name, in line with police policy. He said investigators found the bodies while searching for a 23-year-old woman who had disappeared.

The national broadcaster NHK and other media said police believed the bodies of eight women and one man are hidden in the apartment. The missing woman is thought to be one of them.

The report said the woman had contacted the man via social media.