Japan Man Imprisoned For 1986 Murder Granted Retrial; Judge Doubts Testimony In Fukui Schoolgirl Case (Update 1)

The Yomiuri Shimbun

10:36 JST, October 23, 2024 (updated at 17:00 JST)

The Kanazawa branch of the Nagoya High Court on Wednesday granted a retrial for a 59-year-old man who served a finalized seven-year prison sentence for the murder of a junior high school girl in Fukui in 1986.

The man is Shoshi Maekawa, who was convicted of fatally stabbing a third-year female junior high school student in the face and neck with a kitchen knife while she was home alone at a municipal housing complex in Fukui on the night of March 19, 1986.

“The suspicion cannot be dispelled that the investigative authorities had made improper approaches such as inducement and that false statements from related parties had been formed,” presiding Judge Koji Yamada said as he handed down the decision to grant the retrial.

Maekawa consistently denied the allegations after his arrest in March 1987. There was no direct evidence to show that Maekawa had killed the girl, and the basis for his conviction was the testimony of six acquaintances who made statements such as that they had seen Maekawa with bloodstains after the incident.

During court hearings over the request for a retrial, one of the six acquaintances recanted their previous testimony, saying that they had not actually seen Maekawa.

Judge Yamada said he “follows the principle of ‘benefit of the doubt to the accused,’ which is a cardinal rule of criminal trials.” The court then examined the credibility of this testimony.

During past court hearings, this acquaintance said they remembered a scene from a TV program on the day of the incident. But investigation materials newly provided by prosecutors during the retrial request hearings stated that this program had not actually been broadcast on that day. Referring this point, Yamada said, “Due to inducement by the police, an experience that did not exist had been created.”

Saying that the prosecutors did not mention that the scene was not actually aired on that day even though they knew it since the time of the court hearings, Yamada criticized the prosecutors for “dishonest and sinful misconduct.”

“There was an unfair intention to conceal unfavorable facts,” he said.

Furthermore, regarding the testimony of this acquaintance, the court determined that there were changes in the main parts since the court hearings, and that “it cannot be considered to be evidence that is definitely reliable enough to be used as the basis for a conviction.”

Also, the court pointed out that another acquaintance may have made false statements to mitigate the sentence for their own stimulant drug case, and that other acquaintances may have simply gone along.

The court concluded that “when the old and new evidence is taken together, it cannot be recognized that the level of proof has been established to a degree that exceeds reasonable doubt as to [Maekawa] being the perpetrator.”

The Fukui District Court found Maekawa not guilty in September 1990, but the Kanazawa branch of the Nagoya High Court rejected that and handed down a guilty ruling in February 1995. As for his criminal responsibility, he was judged to have been in a state of diminished mental capacity, but his conviction was finalized by the Supreme Court in November 1997. In 2011, a decision was made to begin a retrial following his first request for a retrial after he had served his seven-year sentence, but this was later overturned. In October 2022, Maekawa filed a second request for a retrial.