A woman who led off a series of lawsuits demanding compensation against the state for forced sterilization surgeries under a now-defunct eugenics protection law reached a settlement Tuesday at a high court and will receive 15 million yen in compensation.
The decision at Sendai High Court comes more than six years after she initially filed her suit and follows a landmark Supreme Court ruling on July 3 this year proclaiming the woman, who is in her 60s, and other plaintiffs were due compensation.
The top court sent the case back to the high court to determine the amount of compensation, after it ordered the government to pay damages to the plaintiffs, having judged the statute of limitations of 20 years for an unlawful act does not apply to cases involving the eugenics law, which was in effect between 1948 and 1996. It also said for the first time that the law was unconstitutional.
In January 2018, the woman, whose name was not disclosed, sued the government seeking 11 million yen in damages over her forced sterilization.
A total of 39 people filed lawsuits at 11 district courts and a branch court. The top court's ruling awarded compensation to victims in five of those cases.
Another plaintiff, a woman from Miyagi Prefecture in her 70s, who also won compensation in the July top court ruling, is currently seeking a settlement at the Sendai High Court.
The now-defunct eugenics protection law had allowed the sterilization of people with intellectual disabilities, mental illnesses, or hereditary disorders without their consent to prevent the birth of "inferior" offspring.
Separately, settlement was also reached the same day between three other plaintiffs who had demanded compensation from the state over their forced sterilization at Sendai District Court. The government agreed to pay them 15 million yen each.
Under the law about 25,000 people were sterilized, 16,000 of them without consent, according to government data.
© KYODO
6 Comments
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WeiWei
15m JPY? Surely there are a couple of 0 missing from the end? 6 years fighting for 15m is nothing as the lawyers fees have raked up. She ends with 2-3m max.. i.e. Nothing
sakurasuki
So in Japan, Govt can take your reproduction right and you'll just get 15 Million Yen in compensation or just USD 100,000.
garypen
For Japan, that's a fairly large legal settlement. They're usually quite small by western standards, similar to their light criminal sentences.
wallace
Lawyers require a fee upfront and then 8-10% of the compensation.
Abe234
I hope the government pay all the costs incurred. So any compensation is free of costs and tax. Makes you wonder why the wheels of justice turn soooo slowly, whether that’s the US, UK, Japan, etc etc. Is it the hope that the costs will be mitigated be the attrition rate as the years go by. In fact it makes me wonder why anyone would have to actually go to court over this. To even actually defend is,as a lawyer, has to be quite disgusting.
Abe234
As a post edit, the 9,000 who supposedly consented, do they get the compensation too. This needs to be answered in the article. Some may genuinely have had a condition where they may not fully have been aware what they were signing. Some may have just went along with it since they were part of an institution with power and authority above them, and they had no advocates.
wallace
Court costs are borne by each party.