Yamagami Appeals Against Life Sentence for Murdering Abe; Defense Wanted Sentence of ‘20 Years or Less’

The Yomiuri Shimbun

2:00 JST, February 5, 2026

The lawyer for Tetsuya Yamagami, who was recently sentenced to life in prison in connection with the 2022 fatal shooting of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, appealed that sentence to the Osaka High Court on Wednesday.

On Jan. 21, the Nara District Court handed down a life sentence, as the prosecution had requested, to Yamagami, 45, for murder and other charges, including violating the Firearms and Swords Control Law.

“After conferring with the defendant, we have submitted a written petition to appeal the sentence handed down by the [Nara] District Court, so that we can have an opportunity to correct this unjust first ruling,” lead defense attorney Masaaki Furukawa said.

Yamagami admitted to the murder charge during his lay judge trial at the district court. During questioning, he said that his family fell apart due to his mother making massive donations to the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification — formerly known as the Unification Church — leading him to resent the church and target Abe, whom he saw as being closely associated with it.

The question of how the defendant’s unhappy personal background affected the incident became a key focus of attention during the trial. The defense argued that Yamagami’s upbringing was “deeply linked to his motive” and “should be afforded the highest importance when determining the sentence,” which they insisted therefore “should be kept to 20 years’ imprisonment or less.”

By contrast, the court, in sentencing Yamagami, conceded that Yamagami’s upbringing had exerted a certain influence on the formation of his personality and thought patterns and indirectly led to his crime, but it said, “deciding to commit murder because you are angry at a religious group is a big leap” and did not accept that his upbringing had been a major factor in the crime.

Regarding the violation of the firearms law, the defense argued for Yamagami’s innocence on the grounds that the regulations did not apply to his homemade gun. However, the court ruled that the shape and high lethality of the weapon meant that he was culpable for it.