Korea Angry Over Manslaughter Verdict In Kanazawa Killing

[Mulboyne]

Yonhap: S. Korea to request Japan's cooperation in alleged murder case
Seoul will ask for Tokyo's help in resolving an alleged case of homicide against a South Korean woman in Japan, after a Japanese court found the killer guilty of manslaughter, not murder, the foreign ministry here said Thursday. "We will raise the issue with the Japanese government," a ministry official said on the condition of anonymity. "We plan to deliver the position of the victim's family as they're unable to accept the Japanese court's ruling and the prosecution's decision not to appeal." The 61-year-old killer, Seiichi Inuma, was sentenced on May 27 to nine years in jail on charges of killing the 32-year-old woman and dismembering and abandoning her body in the city of Kanazawa in Ishikawa Prefecture in June 2009. Prosecutors had demanded 18 years in jail for Inuma, but the Kanazawa District Court reduced the sentence, citing a lack of evidence that he intended to kill her...The South Korean government sent an official request to the Japanese prosecution on Friday, asking them to reconsider their decision not to appeal the sentence...Ministry officials here say a retrial may be possible if the victim's severed head is found, even though the term allowed for an appeal expired on Friday. The ministry has asked the Ishikawa police for their cooperation in finding the severed head...more...

[Kagetsu]

The court system in Japan has always been dodgy, but c'mon. If it wasn't murder, why the hell would he have cut the body up to hide? So he doesn't get busted. He may not have intended to kill the person, but after he did, he intentionally did everything in his power to avoid being caught. That's more on the lines of murder.

[matsuki]

The court system in Japan has always been dodgy

"We Japanese...wait, she was Korean? Nevermind, lets go home."

[Mulboyne]

This intent issue is precisely the one which will come up with Ichihashi.

I suppose it's something that prosecutors did at least try to get a murder verdict, something they were unable to do in the Nozaki case where he dumped the body of a Filipina. It took Nozaki doing the same thing again before police decided it might be worth looking at him as a murderer.

As far as I know, prosecutors intend to charge Ichihashi with murder.

[Ganma]

As far as I know, prosecutors intend to charge Ichihashi with murder.

...or face the wrath of the entire western world (well, at least Britain).

[Coligny]

...or face the wrath of the entire western world (well, at least Britain).

With fukushima.... it seems to be their new line of business... Like DPRK, the only thing they have now to exist in the internationnal scene is to be a pain in the ass...

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

Like DPRK, the only thing they have now to exist in the internationnal scene is to be a pain in the ass...

I'd have thought the LGBT movement did a better job of that.

[bolt_krank]

Maybe he'll just say he did it, get a fine and go...

[Screwed-down Hairdo]

My sympathies go out to the Korean woman's family. I can, however, see why the court ruled the way it did.

Inuma was accused of killing the victim, identified only by her surname of Kang, by beating and strangling her inside a car at a parking lot, after which he cut off her head and dumped the rest of her body on a mountain. The suitcase containing the corpse was discovered in March last year and Inuma turned himself in to the police several days later.

The court, however, said it doubted whether the woman was strangled, citing the testimony of a doctor who performed an autopsy on the body.

Courts can be anal. Being anal myself, I can understand what they're on about at times. What threw me was the charge of manslaughter, which doesn't exist under Japanese law.

I'm assuming Inuma was not just accused but also indicted for strangling Kang. If the indictment read that he had strangled her and the court believed the doctor's testimony that she hadn't been strangled, the judges could (and probably have) found him guilty not of murder but the lesser charge of execution of negligence resulting in death.

Murder needs to be premeditated, or carried out with "murderous intent" as the Japanese phrase it, and it's my guess the court considered there were grounds mitigating against premeditation. Not saying it's good or bad, but that's the way it'll probably be. I'm sure Inuma's sentence was also lightened because he handed himself in. I also get a sniff that the whole story has not come out.

But, when it comes down to it, Kang wasn't blonde or Western, so Japan will tell Korea to fuck off...very politely, of course.