Lawsuit against Hostage Justice

Former Chairman of Kadokawa publishing corporation, Tsuguhiko Kadokawa, filed a lawsuit to Tokyo District Court on June 27. He demanded 220 million yen of compensation to the state of Japan. Kadokawa argues that he was treated in an inhumane manner during he was detained as a suspect and it would violate the Constitution of Japan which prohibits slavish custody. Kadokawa, meanwhile, requested United Nations Human Rights Council to investigate the “hostage justice” of Japan.

Kadokawa was arrested by the Special Investigation Division of Tokyo Public Prosecutors Office in September 2022 with suspicion of bribing with an officer of the Tokyo Organizing Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games. He was indicted next month with charge of bribing 69 million yen for achieving sponsorship in the Olympic and detained in Tokyo Detention Center for 226 days until his fourth request for bail was approved in April 2023.

 

Kadokawa insisted that his lawsuit on the hostage justice had nothing to do with his trial on his bribery, on which he has been denying his crime. His lawyer, Hiroaki Murayama, explained the purpose of the lawsuit as reforming judicial system of Japan by demonstrating that the hostage justice would violate the Constitution of Japan and human rights clauses of international laws. Murayama defined the hostage justice as requesting custody of a person who refuses admitting crime and continuously opposing bail by public prosecutors and court’s affirmation of it.

 

In a book written about his days in Tokyo Detention Center, Proof of Humanity, Kadokawa revealed that he collapsed multiple times, caused by his chronic disease in his heart. “Mr. Kadokawa, you won’t be able to leave here alive. You have to die to get out. Whether you can leave alive depends on the skill of your lawyer,” said a doctor of medical office in the detention center. “Fear and anger shook my whole body,” writes Kadokawa.

 

Kadokawa argues that the public prosecutors opposed bailing him in spite of his fatal health condition, and that the court judge considered whether Kadokawa confessed or denied his crime in the decision on the bail. He criticizes those exercises as discouraging arguments for innocence in trials.

 

Presumption of innocence is the basic principle in Japanese judicial system. Article 34 of the Constitution of Japan lays down that no one should be detained without adequate cause. “Even former interpreter for a professional baseball player Shohei Otani could participate in the trial while he spends normal life. The totally opposite system, reminding me of medieval Europe, still remains in Japan,” said Kadokawa in his press conference.

 

The public prosecutors firmly oppose the accusation of hostage justice, because a bail may cause escaping, destruction of evidence or coordinating the story. Based on those reasons, former chairman of Nissan Motors, Carlos Ghosn, who was arrested with suspicion of failing report on his reward, was in custody for 108 days. Hostage justice sometimes causes a false accusation, because it effectively coerces untrue confession.

 

The lawsuit by Kadokawa will demand the prosecutors a responsibility for explaining legitimacy of current judicial system.