alsace comments

I saw an interview with Marc Cavazos (arrested after a house guest had had drugs sent to his address, but ultimately found not guilty) who said he had 6 hour interrogations.

He gave an anecdote about a session when out of frustration, he retorted to one question with a sarcastic 'Yeah, yeah sure'.It was interpreted as 「その通りです。間違いない。」to the glee of the prosecutor. Luckily Cavazos speaks Japanese and noticed the error.

However, he did say that it was thanks to the video footage of his interrogations being available during the trial, that such linguistic inaccuracies could not be used against him and he believes the existence of the video was an important factor in his acquittal.

I don't know which of his languages Ghosn was actually interrogated in. (I sense French is his strongest, but could be wrong ). Regardless, as he doesn't speak Japanese, he may not have been aware if his responses were properly communicated or not. Any misinterpretation may only have come to light if full footage had been released in court.

If not a movie, then I' d like to see Yamamoto Hyoe make a documentary on it like he did with the Olympus scandal.

Have I just missed it or is there not much info on the supposed other escape mastermind, George- Antoine Zayek? Plenty of stuff on Michael Taylor. Was the box a decoy and the second guy actually Ghosn all along?

2014-7 is well after the introduction of the 'JSOX Compliance' (Financial instruments and Exchange Law) whereby external auditors have to approve financial statements and internal controls.

The under-reported compensation was for money Ghosn may have received post-retirement if he were to take on a consulting role at Nissan.

A company that large would surely have had professional advice telling them whether or not they needed to disclose these as yet unreceived amounts within the financial years under scrutiny. (I believe that only currently payable compensation has to be reported anyhow)

Ironically, this non-disclosure that Nissan is currently facing fines for, was fed by them to the prosecutors in order to get Ghosn arrested in the first place.

Nissan is said to have around eight layers of internal compliance, meaning numerous parties were aware of the future income. If the income should have been reported, why are only Ghosn (and Kelly) being charged? If the income doesn't have to be disclosed....why was this one of the first charges Ghosn faced?

This tragic case highlights everything that's wrong with Japan's 'justice' system because depressingly, over 50 years later, nothing seems to have changed.

As soon as Hakamada was taken in for so-called voluntary questioning, authorities began leaking information to reporters so that all focus was on his guilt from day one.

It should be noted that those items of clothing offered as evidence (supposedly unearthed in a miso tank in the victim's company) just so happened to have been found a mere 400 days after the tanks had been originally searched.....

His confession came after 264 hours of interrogation during which time he'd been poorly fed, sleep deprived and told by the police that even if they killed him, they'd just report his death as due to 'illness'. Then after all that, the man then went through close to 50 years of waking up every morning wondering if that was to be the day of his execution.

Despite Hakamada being in a large amount of debt at the time, only 80000 yen was taken although close to 4 million yen ( crime occured on pay day at the miso factory) was left untouched.

The one surviving member of the family, the eldest daughter, had already moved in with her grandmother as her father did not approve of her boyfriend....I'm no detective, but I wonder if that could have lead to the true killer instead of ruining one man's life and letting a criminal go free.

Can't believe he is still being denied contact with his wife. Even if she were involved, she would have had ample time nearly a year ago to cover up any tracks when he was first arrested plus during the period he was out on bail the first time. What do the prosecution think they are going to say/do that they haven't already?

For anyone interested, former AFB Bureau Chief Philippe Riès: "Behind the Carlos Ghosn Saga" (at the FCCJ available on youtube) offers some thought-provoking insights into the case and its main protagonists.

Agree with the comments about the speed, or lack of it. Not sure if completely correct, but I read that speeds here are 0.5m/second, London is around 0.7 and Hong Kong 0.8. Perhaps experimenting with slightly higher speeds even just at busier times may help those commuters trying to make train/bus connections while reducing the number of people who walk up escalators. A practical approach may be more effective than endless campaigns and lectures.

When the trial finally begins, whoever is chosen as the new Nissan head at the end of October will then be sitting alongside Ghosn in the dock representing the company because Nissan is facing the same charges of Financial Misconduct as he is (the deferred compensation). But the company is hardly going to deny any charges since it instigated the whole farce in the first place and will have to just go along with the prosecution's evidence. That's going to make it very hard for Ghosn's not guilty plea.

The regular workers at Nissan no doubt are very good people, and will be feeling very anxious these days.

However, the higher- ups still seem to be working very closely with the Tokyo Prosecution to make it as hard as possible for Ghosn's legal team to prepare for trial. One of his lawyers, Takano Takashi, has filed an appeal to be able to get copies of some of the data originally passed to the prosecution by Nissan. Although the defense is legally entitled to view/copy such data, the prosecutors are making it difficult and Nissan is embarking on deleting 6000 items ostensibly to 'protect employee privacy'...but 'destruction of evidence' springs to mind.