A 33-year-old man who was lying on a road in Matsue, Shimane Prefecture, died after he was run over by a car on Saturday morning.
The incident occurred at around 12:40 a.m., NTV reported. The driver of the passenger car stopped immediately and called 110 and said he had hit someone lying on the road.
The man on the road, Shinya Otsuka, a national government employee, was taken to hospital where he died two hours later due to hemorrhagic shock.
The scene of the accident was a straight road with good visibility, surrounded by houses and commercial facilities.
Police are currently investigating the details of the incident, including why Otsuka was on the road.
© Japan Today
10 Comments
Login to comment
masugomi
Sorry for the victim. I hope the driver is not punished.
John
I hope driver gets compensated for the wrong act of the deceased person. Roads are not bed.
Garthgoyle
Some years when I first came to Japan, this ALT in the same went out for some drinks and decided to take a nap on road at night. Car passed by and went over him. I think he died before even getting to the hospital.
HopeSpringsEternal
Alcohol seems the likely cause of death, too much of a good thing is definitely not good. RIP
blackpassenger
a good thing and alcohol are mutually exclusive
tora
According to my understanding, the driver will be in all kinds of trouble, since here hitting anybody, even if they are lying right in front of your moving car is treated as a criminal offense.
This stupid law needs to be changed.
Speed
I had a coworker who drank so much that he ended up lying down on the road. I pulled his butt to the side of it and told his butt to stop drinking so much. Maybe the same thing happened here w/o a buddy to pull him out of it.
That username, though.
Perhaps it should be in this case, considering it occured on "a straight road with good visibility."
The driver did call it in immediately though, which suggests things like speed and alcohol weren't factors on the driver's part.
rainyday
I think it needs to be judged on a case by case basis. Obviously people shouldn't be lying on the road and there are situations in which even an alert, cautious driver couldn't avoid them.
On the other there are going to be cases where someone suffers a stroke, falls onto a street and is unable to get up, and a driver looking at their smartphone who could easily have avoided running them over if they had been paying attention.
I agree the law should not assume either of these is the case.
travelbangaijin
The driver is not innocent - that human lying on the road would be the size of a tree log - the driver would have just ran into a log?