A 21-year-old female university student died after she was hit by a car being chased by a police car in Tokyo's Katsushika Ward, police said Sunday.
According to police, the incident occurred on Saturday morning just before 9 a.m. The car being chased by police went through a red light and hit the woman who was on a pedestrian crossing, TBS reported.
Police identified the victim as Yumi Ishii, a resident of Ichihara City in Chiba Prefecture.
Speaking at a news conference late Saturday, a police spokesman said the chase started after police officers saw a car turn the wrong way into a street. When the patrol car approached the car in question, it took off and hit Ishii about 450 meters away, TBS reported.
Ishii was taken to hospital where she was pronounced dead, police said.
Police were quoted as saying the driver of the car, Masaya Ishihara, 22, was driving under the influence of alcohol when he was arrested.
© Japan Today
40 Comments
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sensei258
This crime deserves a very stay in jail. Judges, no suspended sentence please. He ended a young life.
CanadianINtokyo
So a simple DUI turned into a manslaughter charge... bad move son
UK9393
When a death results from some selfish idiot driving under either the influence of alcohol or drugs then they MUST be charged with manslaughter, even murder. THE CONSEQUENCES of DUI is KNOWN. A death resulting in that behavior is therefore premeditated: QED.
Harry_Gatto
Sad indeed. DUI at 9 am?
lucabrasi
@Harry
Could have been from the night before. I heard that 20 per cent of people arrested for drunk-driving in the UK are caught "the morning after".
CrazyJoe
The man should be charged with murder.
Patric Spohn
I hear already people complaining about the police and their chasing tactics. They are already handicapped in mamy ways. See bozo chase. We can expect more limitations put on the police with more gangsters getting away with it :)
Shumatsu_Samurai
Yep. They drink into the early hours, maybe have a short break and then think "oh it's morning, I must be sober now!"
Guy need to go to jail, plain and simple.
Kazuaki Shimazaki
What I'm interested in knowing is how much alcohol. The limits these days are quite low - a person with the lowest possible amount will suffer from mildly delayed reflexes that won't be important under normal conditions.
Without defending drunkards too much, the overemphasis on DUI might have caused this accident. It is possible he only had a bit more than the limit left, and the wrong turn was a mistake. When the police chased him, he realized he might still have alcohol (which will turn a mistake worth at most a few driving points into something fatal) in his system and sped up, causing an accident.
igloobuyer
Japanese are not great drivers in the first place, in the second place nobody should be speeding except ambulances and fire trucks, period. There are other ways to catch a racing car - ever hear of GPS or helicopters?
sensei258
It's not really premeditated, but should be punished as such. Acting with "reckless disregard" for human life, as in driving drunk and running from the police, when it causes a death is murder.
Mirai Hayashi
Such a shame. A young life snuffed out by a drunken idiot. Hope he gets a very long jail sentence
M3M3M3
When it says that he took off after the police approached the car, I wonder if that means both cars had pulled over and the police were on foot or just that the police car was driving behind him and he sped up when they turned on the lights and sirens? Anyone have more info? Thanks.
Steve Crichton
So someone dies because a car turned the wrong way into a street. Thats a disgrace. I am all for chasing people who have known to have murdered or raped or represent a know threat to life but to continue to drive at dangerous speeds on a public road no matter who you are is pure stupidity. Take the plate and send them a fine. Poor girl will not see the New Year . Very sad. Disgraceful.
Badge213
The guy took off just when the police flashed their lights at him, that's pretty much when the accident happened, it's not like the police was chasing the guy for miles and miles then the accident happened. Any case the was under the influence, who knows he would of killed/injured someone anyway by turning the wrong way and driving drunk, police or no police present. Isn't that a threat to life in itself.
KnowBetter
This idiot should be sentence to a term for as long as the person he killed is dead... seems fair, yes?
WA4TKG
I am wondering WHERE in Katsushika Ku....I used to live i. Kameari.
Brian Wheway
My son has just told me that J cops won't give chase if the speeding car is going over 70 MPH, why because the J cops are issued with production run cars so they are not all that fast. so the chance of catching Mr Crook, is pretty low, so my question is why don't they give the J cops a faster car?? then you can catch Mr Crook
Mlodinow
@Brian Wheway, I'm pretty sure that's just a made up thing from the movie Tokyo Drift. JPolice have higher powered cars for highways (though yes, this case was on a normal road).
If you check this link you'll see all manner of sports cars have been used from the early 90s until now. (not all are here on wikipedia btw, I can think of at least the RX-7 & RX-8, R34 Skyline GT-R which are not there. These would have no trouble at all catching Joe public http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_enforcement_in_Japan#Ground
Yubaru
By law here neither of these are supposed to or actually do for the most part go over the speed limit. The cops should be the only ones to legally speed.
Jaymann
people forget the culpability of the Police here too. Police should never pursue criminals at high speed when that action can endanger the lives of innocent bystanders. Had the police taken the car's licence number and discontinued the pursuit it is likely that student would still be alive today. The police are not able to control the actions of drunks (or whomever) fleeing at high speed, but they can regulate their own unsafe practices.
Likely this will not even be considered an issue in this revenge-justice society.
timtak
Accordign to Japanese reports such as http://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/html/20141220/k10014150291000.html the culprit did not have a driver's licence.
Ms. Ishii's parents....
nath
And maybe someone else would be dead as he was a drunk driver, which is an inherently dangerous practice.
It strikes me as irresponsible to blame the police for doing their job - policing.
blvtzpk
@Kazuaki Shimazaki
Nice defense of the indefensible. The police were following up on a traffic violation, and the driver panicked because he apparently knew he was under the influence. It's his fault and his fault only. Period.
As a driver here, I NEVER get behind the wheel after consuming alcohol, even quantities that are deemed negligee in my home country. Why? Because it's the law here. I'm informed by many people in a refur basis here that one has to follow Japanese rules - written and unwritten - while here in Japan, but here it's suggested the rules and their overemphasis are wrong, rather than a focus being placed on the perilous and eventually lethal action of a selfish, inconsiderate driver.
Get you priorities right.
RIP to the young, innocent victim and her family.
Steve Crichton
Forcing/encouraging/pesuing a potentially intoxicated driver is about the most stupid thing an officer can do, Take the plate and charge them for not pulling over and make that fine and penalty a very big one. Girl lives. Dont you all get it Police are not gods that rule the roads. Nobobody has the right to drive at speed on the road. Not evem Schumacher or other F1 greats.
nath
Again, you can't know that this guy wouldn't have gone on to hit and kill someone else. Getting drunk drivers off the road ASAP needs to be a priority.
100% of the fault lies with this guy. He chose to drive drunk, he chose to run when the cops tried to pull him over. You shouldn't blame them for his mistakes. They were his mistakes, not theirs.
lucabrasi
@Strangerland
Agreed, the cops were just doing their job and can't be blamed.
But with CCTV, drones and satellites, the police shouldn't need to be involved in high-speed chases, which endanger themselves, the person they're chasing and innocent bystanders.
blvtzpk
Based on the information here the police were simply acting on a traffic infringement, not on suspicion of a drunk driver. Unless I learn otherwise, they were dealing with a traffic violator, pure and simple.
Also, the manner the police attempted to apprehend the driver (a 'chase') is also up for grabs. I doubt if we're talking about a Formula 1 style, video-game road race. Just read the article - the car they were pursuing traveled a mere 450 meters after it'd been approached. What type of speed could have been achieved on the streets of a Tokyo ward in 450 meters?
In any respect, while I don't think it was something out of The Fast and the Furious, the driver did eventually run a red light and that's how he ended the life of a woman.
A panicked traffic violator who we later find out is (a) under the influence and (b) unlicensed (according to timtak's post) is the person in the wrong here, not the police.
Yuya Koike
He should receive a death sentence.
Kazuaki Shimazaki
I'm not trying to defend the indefensible. However, it could be a day when the downside of the massively strengthened penalties against DUI had a disadvantage. It is dishonest to not at least consider it.
One reason we don't hand out death penalties for minor crimes is so the criminal is less inclined to risk extreme measures to protect themselves. That doesn't excuse the criminal, but it is a factor to consider when setting punishments.
And that's the potential problem with DUI - same stupid act that when sober is a few points become disqualifying. What do you think happens?
Also, there is a reason why I ask "How much alcohol". A person who can hardly walk straight shouldn't be driving. But a person who's just over the limit may be safer left alone.
Zimiz
http://www.cnet.com/pictures/top-10-coolest-cop-cars-photos/3/ @brian, nissan skyline gtr r34 hits about 186 mph topspeed on a street version.
As for me 100% drivers fault, drunk or not! I hope this guy wont see the sun for awhile.
ebonyninja
DUI gone wrong, resulting in a death, and losing your license in Japan is not an issue considering the extensive transportation system.
Yubaru
Actually you are and you even so so as much right here....
There is no level that should be acceptable, each individual person reacts differently to alcohol, and even one drink can impair a person, yet laws can not be written to take those cases into effect.
This comment btw is blatantly false.
Kazuaki Shimazaki
They also react differently to a vast number of different things, including ordinary fatigue and sleep deprivation. Ideally, everyone driving a car should be in their best shape, but we know that does not happen. Yet we single out only drunkn-ness. One beer and otherwise alert, out. Undrunk but otherwise near dead, fine.
I've said it in my first post - I don't want to defend the guy. However, since it has already happened, I find an analysis which does not at least consider the influence of blowback from harsh laws to be simple-minded.
And before you say I'm somehow benefitting from this ... I don't drink. I hate the smell of drink. For all that, I realize drinking has not been banned (though that's not unpleasant to me). I also realize in Japan, whether you drink is not perfectly voluntary.
Kabukilover
Clearly the drunk driver is at fault here. I am, however, against car chases. particularly on busy streets. This is not the first time a bystander was killed because of a police chase. i don't blame the officers in this case as they were doing what they were supposed to be . But I do believe the matter of chases needs urgent review.
nandakandamanda
The driver did not have a licence 運転免許証を持っておらず seems ambiguous. If he was not carrying it at the time, they would have said, 免許不携帯 Menkyo Fukeitai, and yet driving without a valid license would normally be reported as 無免許運転 Mumenkyo Unten. A softer way of saying Mumenkyo, I guess.
Any sentence passed on him will take into account the depth of regret that he may express.
Part of the problem here is the very weight of drink-driving laws which have been loaded up to reflect international standards or even beyond. The first reaction of some people seems to be to run, hoping that residual blood alcohol levels will drop before they eventually get caught.
Brian Wheway
miodinow, thank you for the info, when my son told me about this it seemed a bit daft, but you know what teenager are like! I've been enlightened.
tim can
Another victim of the zero tolerance policy.
Draconian laws have been known to be counter-productive since ancient times, thus the etymology of the word "draconian". So many people are just plain incapable of learning.
Steve Crichton
General rule here if you drink DO NOT drive within a 24 hour period after your last drink. Easy and simple stuff. They have zero tolerance here.
nath
It's not zero tolerance. I believe that it's 0.03.