Yokohama Court Orders U.S. Soldier Pay ¥16.45 Mil. to 4 Victims Over Assault

The Yomiuri Shimbun

15:41 JST, April 26, 2025

YOKOHAMA — A district court on Friday ruled that a U.S. soldier must pay a total of \16.45 million in compensation for injuring four people after slamming into them with his body in Zushi, Kanagawa Prefecture, in July 2022.

The four are in their 20s to 60s and filed the civil lawsuit with the Yokohama District Court, demanding that the American pay a total of ¥21.6 million in compensation for their physical and mental suffering after he slammed into them on the evening of July 9, 2022, near a beach in the city. The soldier belonged to the U.S. naval base in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture, at the time of the assault.

The soldier had “accumulated frustration due to his chronic illness,” the presiding judge acknowledged. Under the influence of alcohol, which impaired his self-control, the man “impulsively directed his anger toward passersby,” the judge added.

He rejected the claim that the soldier had been suffering “severe impaired consciousness due to acute alcohol poisoning.”

In addition to this civil lawsuit, the district court’s Yokosuka Branch sentenced the U.S. soldier to two years and four months in prison, suspended for four years, on assault charges in September last year. The sentence has been finalized.