Shuichi Aizawa

Shuichi Aizawa aka Afro Cop (相沢 周市, Aizawa Shūichi) is a member of the Japanese Task Force.

Appearance
Aizawa has black hair and dark eyes. He has a rather large afro, though it becomes gradually smaller. After the time skip he sports facial hair and receives a hair cut.

Character
Aizawa is a respected member of the NPA and Task Force. He takes his work very seriously and for this reason does not approve of Misa Amane's antics. He becomes annoyed when she or someone else refers to her as Misa-Misa, and often chides Matsuda for his immature behavior.

Aizawa appears to hold L in contempt, although he does have some respect for him. After the NPA cuts the funding of the Task Force, L gives the members a choice of staying or leaving. If they stay with the Task Force, they will no longer receive a paycheck from the NPA, and because he needs to care for his family Aizawa thinks of leaving. After Watari states to L that he (L) had set aside money for the Task Force members for this kind of situation, Aizawa becomes furious. L reveals that he hadn't mentioned the money because he wanted to see what Aizawa would choose to do. As a result of this dispute with L, Aizawa leaves the Task Force but later returns.

Aizawa is intelligent and is the first of the Task Force to suspect Light Yagami as being Kira after Light becomes leader of the Task Force. When Light begins communicating with Kiyomi Takada, Aizawa suspects that Light and Takada are passing notes off-camera and decides to mark the hotel note pads with a small hole. When he checks the hotel room after Light and Takada leave, he finds that the note pads present in the room do not have holes. This confirms his suspicions, as the hotel workers would have no reason to replace the note pads unless the others had been used up.

Plot
When the NPA discontinues to provide support for the Japanese Task Force, Aizawa returns to the NPA due to L's withholding of the vital fact that Watari would provide the task force with financial support, regardless. He returns before L's death, where he is one of the first people to suspect Light of being Kira, and helps contribute to his eventual defeat. He becomes the leader of the investigation team afterwards.

Aizawa has a wife and child, named Eriko and Yumi. Aizawa and his wife also have a baby son. Halfway through the series, it is implied that Aizawa and his wife were having marital problems, as a result of his (Aizawa's) working on-call 24 hours and rarely being home. Aizawa's daughter and wife both seem to miss him, and Yumi is happy whenever he comes home. However, his wife Eriko tends to take it in a more hostile manner. He is shown in a park, where by chance he sees his family; he begins to cry while holding his daughter. It is unknown whether he and his family were able to mend, as they are not mentioned by Aizawa after the incident.

Films
Main Articles: Death Note (Live action film) and Death Note: The Last Name

Aizawa's role in the film is more or less the same as it is in the manga and anime, although some large changes were made. Aizawa doesn't suspect Light of being Kira as he does in the manga and anime, the plot point regarding Aizawa and Near is absent (Near is not in the films), and the issues with his family are primarily absent.

Conception
Obata said that he did not plan to draw Aizawa for an extended period of time, so he "began to worry" when Aizawa continued appearing "more and more." Obata felt that originally his face was not "good for a main character" so he said he decided to "gradually make him more presentable. [laughs]" and increase the volume of his hair. Obata believes that Aizawa was "easy to draw" and that it is easy for him to draw people who "act consistently." Obata said that he drew Aizawa while believing that "it would be nice if there were lots of people like him in Japan." Obata redesigned Aizawa to "look older" and "really make it feel like four years had passed since L's death."

Towards the end of Death Note, Ohba decided to make Aizawa the chief of the NPA because he did not want to create a new character in the final chapter. Ohba felt that Aizawa is the best person to be the NPA head because Aizawa held connections to the Japanese police and knows Near. Ohba also said that whilst the other former Kira Investigation Team members had the same qualifications, he did not want to use Mogi due to his lack of personality development, nor Ide because he was so recently re-introduced and readers knew so little about him. Then he laughingly added, "Matsuda was out of the question! Maybe after Aizawa retires? We will see if he matures..." Obata then asked Ohba: "Do we make a new manga for just Matsuda?" And Ohba replied, "Of course not. Baka [Idiot] Takeshi-san." [Note: Ohba was joking with Obata, making a reference to the phrase often used by L, Light, and Aizawa: "Baka Matsuda!" [In English dub, "Matsuda, you idiot!"]