Here
and
Now

opinions

Hung jury

26 Comments
By Kevin Mcgue

In December 1948, Sakae Menda was arrested in rural Kyushu on the charge of stealing some rice. This was a common crime in Japan’s hungry postwar years, and his case would have been open-and-shut had it not been for the murder of a Buddhist priest and the priest’s wife in a nearby town.

Although Menda had an alibi that was supported by witnesses, he was arrested and interrogated for six days without food or water, after which he signed a confession that was the only evidence presented at his trial. Without even understanding the difference between the police station and the courtroom, Menda was tried, convicted and sentenced to death.

Each morning in solitary confinement, Menda listened as the sound of clinking keys approached his cell. A guard would pause outside the door, and the prisoner would become paralyzed with fear. Then the guard would move on. If the clinking keys stopped at another cell and the door swung open, the inmate inside would be led to the gallows. Menda endured this psychological torture every day for 34 years.

In 1983, after countless calls for a retrial, a court admitted that the police had suppressed evidence which supported Menda’s alibi, and he became the first person in Japan’s history to be released from death row.

Menda went on to become one of the country’s most vocal opponents of capital punishment. Shortly after his release, three other men were also exonerated and freed. More recently, a judge who handed down the sentence of a fourth man—this one on death row for 42 years—went public with his belief that trial evidence was fabricated. These high-profile cases have sparked a debate over capital punishment that continues today.

Reforms have moved slowly, however, as the whole system seems designed to prevent public or political discussion. Inmates are kept in solitary confinement, and visits by family and legal counsel are limited. Execution orders are given to guards and inmates on the same day they are carried out. Journalists, families of the condemned, and relatives of victims are never granted entrance to the execution chamber. You will not find the likes of Sean Penn and Sister Helen Prejean holding candlelight vigils outside prisons, as the public is only notified of executions after they occur. Until December 2007, even the names of the condemned were withheld from the public. Executions are scheduled when the Diet is not in session to prevent protest from opposition parties.

This secrecy has so separated the average person in Japan from state-sanctioned killing that the issue has become an abstraction for the public and a taboo for politicians. Yet capital punishment is not a hypothetical ethical dilemma, but an actual practice in which the government exterminates human life in our name.

Justice Minister Kunio Mori recently said that the time has come for public debate on the topic, prompted by Japan’s recent introduction of a trial-by-jury system. This system brings the public closer to the death penalty, as ordinary citizens may be called upon to decide on the ultimate sentence.

As it stands now, the public is overwhelmingly in favor of capital punishment—a 2005 survey found that over 80% of the population supports it. Mori has urged citizens to continue their support, saying the death penalty deters violent crime and maintains social order.

However, if the example of the U.S. is anything to go by, that argument is wrong. In America, each state has the power to decide whether to allow capital punishment, and those states that use the death penalty consistently have higher murder rates than those that do not. While such statistics don’t conclusively prove that deterrence doesn’t work, they likewise fail to support the argument that it does. If the death penalty were lifted in Japan, the murder rate would rise, fall, stay the same—or, most likely, do some combination of the three over time. But it would be impossible to prove or disprove any connection to the lack of capital punishment.

Much more specious is Mori’s claim that social order is supported by destroying human life on behalf of the citizenry—in effect, forcing us to kill whether we support the death penalty or not. The new jury system has brought the people of Japan closer to a practice that has always weighed on them and, hopefully, one step closer to rejecting this practice.

The last word goes to Sadamichi Hirasawa, another long-term death row inmate who many now feel was unjustly condemned—but who, unlike Menda, died of natural causes in prison. Explaining why he fought to prove his innocence and to end capital punishment, Hirasawa said, “I am trying to get rid of a misfortune imposed on all people in Japan.”

Kevin Mcgue is a freelance journalist based in Tokyo.

This commentary originally appeared in Metropolis magazine (www.metropolis.co.jp).

© Japan Today

©2024 GPlusMedia Inc.

26 Comments
Login to comment

Even though I am in favor of capital punishment for hideous crimes, studies show that the death penalty is not effective as a crime prevention measure. If death were an effective deterrent, then people would stop having children because birth leads to an inevitable death. All the death penalty really does is set an exact time and place for the inevitable death to occur. As gruesome as it may seem by western standards, the middle east had the best deterrent for crime. For example, if you stole something, they would cut off your hands. You would still live, and you would be a constant reminder to would be thieves of the punishment that awaits them.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

In Japan, confessions are treated as the "king of evidence." Once the suspect confesses, the police wrap up the investigation and ignore all other extenuating factors. Furthermore police, prosecutors and judges alike will treat a suspect who confesses more leniently than one who keeps insisting he didn't do it, so confessing is the only way to get the police to stop the interrogation. (And naturally the suspect may not have a lawyer present during questioning.)

The system -- of presumed guilt until proven innocent -- was so bad that when the US wrote Japan's new constitution in 1946, it phrased Article 36 as follows: "The infliction of torture by any public officer and cruel punishments are absolutely forbidden." It is noteworthy that the word "absolutely" appears nowhere else in the Constitution.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

But it would be impossible to prove or disprove any connection to the lack of capital punishment.

So remove capital punishment then, this guy just said in this sentence that it wouldn't make a difference if Japan has it or not.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

I think people in Japan are so in favor of the death penalty, because they feel they would never ever have to face it. Everyone should behave in Japan. Comparing the USA to Japan is completly unfair in everyway. In the USA we don't break the law because we don't want to get caught. Here, in Japan we dont break the law becuase, well... Its the Law. There is no fear of getting caught. No one wants to break the rules. Its a persnal and and cultural code. No one here could care less if you are five minutes late. The person who is five minutes late will care though. He or she will be riddled with guilt for weeks. Feeling awfule about not getting there 30 minutes early like everyone else. Breaking an actual law (running red lights NOT included) is just out of the question. The few people here who do break laws are the extremely desprate, the hopeless, the yakuza, the sick (like rape, child porn, ect). In america 1100 avg dudes has probably sold dope. 120 smoked doped. In college in the USA I didnt know a person that didn't break some sort of law on a fairly regular basis. Granted most of those laws were drugs, or driving under the influence, but nonetheless those are still laws that no one felt any guilt about breaking.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

If all Japan's executions were carried out in public in Ueno Park and put on TV I don't think that 80% would remain in favour for very long.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

In the USA we don't break the law because we don't want to get caught.

Considering the numbers incarcerated in US jails, it would appear your 'we' doesn't include an awful lot of Americans.

In college in the USA I didnt know a person that didn't break some sort of law on a fairly regular basis.

You mean American college kids would rather go to jail than stay in college?

0 ( +0 / -0 )

where is the justice in a proven murderer getting to live out his life whether in prison or not. the victim was never give the priviledge. the problem is not the punishment but the proof.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

There is research that shows that the murder rate increases in the months following the announcement that executions have taken place in Japan. I.e. rather than a detterent, the death penalty seems to augment violent crime. The authors conclude these results imply that the abolishment of capital punishment will not increase the homicide rate but decrease it. Therefore, retention of capital punishment is not meaningful in Japan if its detterent effect is the major reason for its retention. In Japan no studies have been conducted to examine the effect of capital punishment, but public opinion has supported the (supposed) deterrent effect and thus its retention. Although the data of this study have limitions, we argue that they are meaninful enough to make Japanese people consider the lack of evidenence for public opinion. At present Japanese people do not seem to have strong reasons for believing in the deterrent effect of capital punishment.

http://tinyurl.com/4pn2bb

Akira Sakamoto, Kiyoko Sekiguchi, Aya Shinkyu, Yuko Okada (2003) "Does Media Coverage of Capital Punishment Have a Deterrent Effect on the Occurence of Brutal Crimes? An Analysis of Japanese Time-Series Data from 1959 to 1990". in "Progress in Asian Social Psychology: Conceptual and Empirical Contributions" By Guoshu Yang, Paul B. Pedersen. Greenwood Publishing Group.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

1- What percentage of Japanese people is aware that "Executions are carried out by hanging". (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_Japan)

2- Didn't the recent various events of random killing, such as the stabbing episode in Akiba, turn out to be a form of suicide, the culprit expecting a death sentence for his act?

If you do not deserve to die for whatever crime you committed, you just don't. And if someone did something wrong enough, then he probably deserves to slowly rot alone, away from our society, rather than being given the easy escape of death.

Not everyone fears death, in Japan in particular some people actually desire it and will try to have a "grand" last appearance instead of going alone... Capital punishment is likely to be more harmful than productive in such conditions.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

InakaRob The Japanese do seem to be very moral on the whole. But at the same time there may be a shift in the types of immoral behaviour. Theft, drugs and violent crime are very low, but political and white collar crime (c.f. Transparency international) is quite high. Copyright abuse, plagiarism, and fraud may also be fairly prevalent. Copyright laws are less strict so one can rent CD's and copy them without even infringing the law. I am not sure how much American college students copy other students work, but here it is extremely popular. How about lying? The concept of the white lie seems to have been extended to quite a significant degree. On the whole even so, I think that there is a higher standard of personal morality here in Japan, but also there is a shift in the "crimes" that are considered to be important.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Surely, whether Menda received the death penatly or life imprisonment doesn't really matter? It's not the penalty that is the problem, it's the system that found an innocent man guilty; and of course someone got away with murder.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Tetsukon: Prisoners on death row in Japan do not mix with the general prison population and have almost no privileges except visits by the clergy, infrequent bathing and exercise. By the time the system gets around to executing them they are already insane (if they weren't already) through sensory deprivation.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

The death penalty is being debated but the root of this story is the fact that the police fabricated evidence or with held it to get a conviction rather than the truth. How many others are convicted wrongly in Japan allowing the culprits to be free. If the truth was the issue in an investigation, the death penalty issue would be a lesser problem because there would be a far higher probability that the convict was in fact the perpetrator.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

State sanctioned murder is still murder. The deterrent argument does not hold water. And the risk of executing an innocent should morally outweight any perceived benefit of executing people.

Judicial systems are imperfect. Judges, police and jurys are imperfect. People are imperfect. Therefore the danger of murdering an innocent person are too high making this form of punishment unthinkable and morally reprehensible.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Beelzebub, what is your point? The death penalty is worse than life imprisonment? I think that's pretty obvious. My point is the shocking behaviour of the prosecution which is a wider issue than just the death penalty. Eliminating the death penalty is not going to fix the justice system here.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Japan is down right primitive when it comes to its "justice system" & the powers that be still to this day have a free hand to do(& they do!) as they damn well please, truth has nothing to necessarily to do with it

0 ( +0 / -0 )

I'm with the 80%. At least the capitally punished have a very low recidivissm rate.

And, tkoind2, if the risk of executing an innocent should morally outweight any perceived benefit of executing people, shouldn't the risk of imprisoning an innocent should morally outweight any perceived benefit of imprisoning people?

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Eliminating the death penalty is not going to fix the justice system here.

Hey, Tetsukon, I'm glad you got my point :)

0 ( +0 / -0 )

TravellingSales says: "I'm with the 80%. At least the capitally punished have a very low recidivissm rate." This presumes that the system is never wrong and that innocent people are never executed. Given the instances of false convictions in this story and doubts expressed in many states in the US about police investigations, the quality of court-appointed defence lawyers, it is obvious that innocent people have been executed. This fact alone makes the death penalty a bad idea, apart at all from studies that show that it does not deter people from committing violent crime. If the death penalty had been available in the UK during the 1970s, the Birmingham Six (who were innocent) would most certainly have hanged.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

What appalling stories of inhumanity. I have really enjoyed my time here in Japan but there is one thing that does stand out to me as lacking more than anything else and that is a sense of social responsibility... The police, judges, city workers are all working for society at large and experiencing what I have, and hearing of such atrocities saddens me deeply. One has to wonder if they have a conscience at all.

Of course I know that in most any country public service lends itself to inefficiency, graft and self service but it does seem to be a major problem here. It is really not much different at all than my experience of living in Mexico. My friend once asked me what Jland was like and I said that it is like Mexico with a good coat of varnish.

I hope that the up and coming public servants can start to get the understanding that they are just that, paid servants to the public that pays their salary.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

A death for a death mentality is the most primitive and least effctive form of social justice, it lingers on in any 'lynchmob' based system, as in USAs Southern States(see the stats that back this up). At best it has the effect of squeezing a boil. ie - one person becomes the focus in a seething, screaming mass of revenge, and when eliminated - the noise dies down, but only temporarily. It does not help to expect 'western style' morality or justice - from a social order that does not have the same roots. For small easy example - a western 'sin' against morality - comes from an interpretation of the idea of 'bearing false witness' - considered immoral in the west.

But 'lying' to put an enemy, or social alien - for whatever reason, into the can, is not viewed in the same light in other societies/philosophies. People not accustomed to the idea - who come up against that experience, and find their good name, or good reputation, damaged, may find it incomprehensible and evil, and very hard to deal with. A very different kind of 'defence' consciousness is necessary in order to do so, morally.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Hung jury

It would be if I were on it.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

There are many, many issues I wanted to add to this article, but could not due to limited word count.

Here are a few additional points:

Deterrence - Agnes Heller points out that the death penalty can not deter violent crimes because they fall into three general categories: 1) Crimes of profit, in which the criminal carefully plans and really believes they will never get caught, and so is not deterred. 2) Crimes of passion. If someone hates their spouse so much they kill them, they are not thinking of consequences in the heat of the moment. 3) Crimes of compulsion, including people who commit crimes against children, torture, etc. These people have a warped sense of morality, and are so so strongly compelled to do the horrible things they do, no threat can deter them. Furthermore, as others have commented here, some people have commit horrible crimes precisely because the death penalty exists. Mamoru Takeda killed 8 kids in a school and injured many more. He told police he wanted many times to commit suicide but could bring himself to do it, and so wanted the death penalty.

Inhumanity - in the past some people have commented that if Japan does want to get rid of the death penalty, they should at least get a more human method like lethal injection. Despite the fact that "human killing" is an oxymoron, consider this: A recent medical study in the US examined 49 lethal injections, and found in 43 cases the person was not given sufficient anesthesia, and would have experienced excruciating pain while other drugs paralyzed them and induced cardiac arrest. In all cases, the did not meet the legal standards imposed for putting down animals. In other words, if a humane society euthanized a dog using this method, they would face legal action from the government. In the case of hanging, in Britain before they abolished the death penalty, they worked out a formula for adjusting the length of the rope based on the persons weight. If the rope is too short, the person has to choke to death, which actually can take quite a long time, even hours. If the rope is too long, they are decapitated. If the rope is just the right length, the neck is snapped and death is more or less instant. This system was used in Britain and is still used in Singapore. Is it used in Japan? No one knows. Almost all details of executions are kept secret. The justice ministry says they are doing this for the benefit of society, why then do they hide the details from society?

The Legal System - I agree that abolishing the death penalty would not fix the judicial system. There would still be a lot of people convicted on forced confessions and flimsy evidence. The difference is, if someone is in prison for life, they have a chance to be acquitted if new evidence proves them innocent, this is still a very, very slim chance in Japan, but still. If someone is executed, then of course there is no chance.

Agnes Heller says, "If you support the death penalty, and only one innocent person is executed, and killing an innocent person is murder, then you become a murderer and you must agree to be executed according to that system you support." Forensic science is still developing. In the US lots of people have been released from death row because of DNA evidence, which was something no one had even imaged 40 years ago. In the future, there be a way to irrefutably prove that an innocent person was executed by Japan. When that happens, people in Japan will start to call for the end of this.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

i am all for anti-death penalty especially in japan. by the nature of japanese, i think death penalty will do more harm than good. KevinMcgue give the very good examples already.

however my concern is not in japan. hanging is still far better than decapitation as still in use in Saudi Arabia. the last one was in 2007 when saudi's court ordered behead four men, and ruled that the bodies of the four workers be crucified for public view as an example for others!!

that was 2007!

0 ( +0 / -0 )

If Japan would have just killed the guy the police and the justice system wouldn't look so stupid!

0 ( +0 / -0 )

alohajapan: No, I think the justice system would still find some other person or way to make them look stupid.

How many innocents have been forced/starved/beaten into confessions and been put to death? I'll wager at least 1, and that's one too many. If you abolish the death penalty, you run the risk of overcrowding of Japanese prisons; seems as though some even WANT to be arrested for food and shelter. Abolishing the death penalty will also not improve the skill, insight, and prowess of J-police, they'll likely be terrible forever.

So what to do? Can you trust the Japanese justice system, where forced confessions still abound? Personally, I'd be 100% willing to risk abolishing the death penalty if only to save a few innocent lives.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Login to leave a comment

Facebook users

Use your Facebook account to login or register with JapanToday. By doing so, you will also receive an email inviting you to receive our news alerts.

Facebook Connect

Login with your JapanToday account

User registration

Articles, Offers & Useful Resources

A mix of what's trending on our other sites