Shinzo Abe’s Shooter Given Life in Prison after Hundreds Line Up to Hear Verdict

The Yomiuri Shimbun

17:54 JST, January 21, 2026

The Nara District Court on Wednesday sentenced Tetsuya Yamagami to life in prison for fatally shooting former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in 2022. Prosecutors had sought a life sentence.

“The defendant approached the victim himself, waited for an opening and fired twice, aiming at the victim’s upper body from behind,” said Presiding Judge Shinichi Tanaka. “This act is despicable and extremely malicious.”

“Bullets from the homemade firearm struck a wide area. There was a possibility that others besides the victim could have been hit,” the judge added.

The 45-year-old unemployed defendant sat motionless on the witness stand.

The indictment accused Yamagami of shooting Abe, then 67, with a homemade gun during a street speech by the former prime minister in support of a House of Councillors candidate in front of Kintetsu Railway Co.’s Yamato-Saidaiji Station in Nara on the afternoon of July 8, 2022.

Yamagami, his long hair tied back, appeared in court at 1:30 p.m. When the presiding judge read out the verdict, the defendant kept his head bowed and showed little change in expression.

Yamagami, in addition to being charged with murder, was accused of violating the Firearms and Swords Control Law, among other laws.

One point of contention in the case was whether the firearms law as written at the time of the incident applied to the homemade firearm used. The defense had argued that it did not apply, but the presiding judge ruled that the firearm was a violation of the law as stated in the indictment based on its shape and lethality.

During questioning, Yamagami said that his family fell apart when his mother donated ¥100 million to the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification — also known as the Unification Church — leading him to resent the church and target Abe, believed by the defendant to have been closely associated with the church.

The key question in the lay judge trial was how much weight should be given to the defendant’s upbringing, which was turbulent after his mother’s donations ripped his family apart.

In its closing arguments, the prosecution argued that the defendant targeted Abe because he felt frustrated that he could no longer attack the church due to financial distress, and that his “motive was self-centered.”

The prosecution also argued that many people endure a difficult upbringing without committing crimes, saying, “His upbringing had an extremely limited impact on his decision to commit a crime, and it should not significantly lessen the severity of the punishment.”

It was then stressed that the crime was “unprecedented in postwar history, resulted in extremely grave consequences and had a significant societal impact.”

The defense argued in its closing statement that Yamagami “was a victim of abuse” involving the church.

It said his unfortunate upbringing formed “the core of this case,” was “deeply linked to his motive” and “should be given the highest importance when determining the sentence.”

The defense then insisted that the sentence “should be kept to 20 years’ imprisonment or less.”

The shooting three years ago is the first case since World War II of a former prime minister being fatally attacked. Wednesday’s trial attracted 685 people, who lined up for the 31 seats in the court’s gallery.

Abe’s wife, Akie, 63, released a comment Wednesday in response to the ruling. “I feel that the long period of days since my husband’s sudden death has come to a close of sorts,” it read.

To the defendant, she wrote, “I hope he will face up to what he has done and atone for the crime of taking the life of an irreplaceable family member — my husband.”