FG Crime victims

[Bucky]

[blackcat]

From what I have seen, heard and read I am quite sure there are more foreign victims of crime in Japan that perps.

[Mulboyne]

This story has made it to the Yomiuri:

Family queries cause of U.S. man's death

The bereaved family of a U.S. man who died in 2004 at his condominium in Fukuoka will ask police on Wednesday to reinvestigate the cause of his death, after an autopsy carried out at the insistence of the bereaved family found injuries contradicting the initial judgment made by police. Even though the Fukuoka prefectural police found a lump on the man's head, police did not carry out an autopsy and instead judged the man to have died of an illness. According to police, the naked body of Matthew Lacey was found on his bed on Aug. 17, 2004, by his friends, who came to his condominium in Chuo Ward, Fukuoka. Lacey's room was on the sixth floor of the building. He was 41 years old.

At the time, police decided that no intruder had entered his condo. They were also unable to find any evidence of a fight or struggle. Police discovered that Lacey had a been going to hospital for the treatment of irritable bowel syndrome. They found traces of fecal material on the floor of the kitchen next to the bedroom. Police, after hearing the opinion of a police doctor, decided Lacey had died of an illness related to dehydration and diarrhea, an explanation they gave to the bereaved family. Japanese and U.S. specialists who were consulted by the family and shown the police records relating to the death, both suggested the possibility of murder, according to the family.

Police only conducted an autopsy after the bereaved family requested them to do so. The autopsy revealed the man died from a serious injury caused by a blow to the head. After the autopsy, the police changed the judgment of the cause of death, saying he died from an accidental fall. The bereaved family, including Matthew's elder brother Charles, 46, of Nagoya, who is an English teacher, dissatisfied with the police explanation for the cause of death, will visit the prefectural police headquarters and request a reinvestigation of the case.

In the wake of the scandal involving the Tokitsukaze stable--in which a young sumo wrestler was initially judged to have died of heart failure, but later was found to have died of traumatic shock after being beaten--the new judgment may again cast doubt on the way police make visual inspections when determining the cause of death and how autopsies are carried out.

[Behan]

It looks like the police just can't be bothered to open a murder investigation.

I think a few years back there was a news report about there being a lack of coroners in at least some places in Japan. Anyone know about this?

[Mulboyne]

Useless fact of the day: the man who conducted the autopsies of Marilyn Monroe, Robert Kennedy, John Belushi Janis Joplin etc was born in Japan and emigrated to the US when he was in his mid-twenties.

Thomas Noguchi

[Behan]

Was he called in to do those because he was famous or something? Otherwise it would be a huge coincidence. I'd guess he must have been requested.

[Mulboyne]

Was he called in to do those because he was famous or something? Otherwise it would be a huge coincidence. I'd guess he must have been requested.

He was the Chief L.A. Medical Examiner so tended to get a lot of celebrity cases.

[Behan]

I think there might have been an article in the Japan Times about him some years back. If I remember correctly he was part of the inspiration for the great Quincy series. Quincy actually had a Japanese-American co-worker, too.
After Columbo, Quincy was god.

[Bucky]

There also was another Japanese actor on Quincy M.E.

On "Quincy, M.E.", Yuki [Shimoda] starred as Dr. Hiro, a forensic medical examiner in an episode, "Has Anybody Here Seen Quincy?" that did not include star, Jack Klugman. Yuki was considered for a spin-off of "Quincy, M.E.", where he would be a coroner like Thomas Noguchi, M.D. the Los Angeles County coroner to many newsworthy deaths.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuki_Shimoda

[Adhesive]

The naked body of Matthew Lacey was found on his bed...The autopsy revealed the man died from a serious injury caused by a blow to the head.

Looks like somebody was jumping on the mattress again.