FG Rape Victim in Legal No-Man's Land

[Mulboyne]

[floatl][/floatl]Kyodo via Yahoo: Rape victim seeks better attitude from Japan's police, U.S. military
In the early hours of an April morning in 2002, Wendy (not her real name) was raped by a U.S. serviceman inside her van at a parking lot in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture. After an insufficient response from the Japanese police, realizing there was no 24-hour rape crisis center in Japan and seeing that both Japanese prosecutors and the U.S. Navy had decided not to pursue charges against the suspect, she became determined to stand up and seek change so that future victims would not have to go through what she did. In a civil lawsuit she filed to seek damages from the perpetrator, who was a crew member of the U.S. Navy's aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk, the Tokyo District Court recognized in November 2004 that the defendant raped her and ordered him to pay her 3 million yen. But Wendy has no way of claiming the payment from the man, as he left Japan during the course of the trial, was released from the U.S. military and his whereabouts remains unknown. Her fight has been a difficult one, as her mostly single-handed efforts have often brought her up against a wall of bureaucracy in both Japan and the United States. Being an Australian citizen residing in Japan has also complicated things...more...

[American Oyaji]

That's messed up.

Really messed up.

[Greji]

Kyodo via Yahoo: Rape victim seeks better attitude from Japan's police, U.S. military[/URL]-snip-After an insufficient response from the Japanese police, realizing there was no 24-hour rape crisis center in Japan and seeing that both Japanese prosecutors and the U.S. Navy had decided not to pursue charges against the suspect, she became determined to stand up and seek change so that future victims would not have to go through what she did. In a civil lawsuit she filed to seek damages from the perpetrator, who was a crew member of the U.S. Navy's aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk, the Tokyo District Court recognized in November 2004 that the defendant raped her and ordered him to pay her 3 million yen....more...

This article just doesn't read right! Rape is a terrible offense and it is political dynamite! I'm not trying to say it didn't happen as stated, but it sounds awfully strange at a time when both the Governments of the US and Japan are so critically aware of backlash to the slightest incident. The individuals making comments on her behalf are obviously anti-military (with or without good reason) and it would appear not too knowleadgable of the Justice system of Japan or the military, even though the one J-guy is identified as a lawyer.

Just being the devil's advocate in this case, she would probably win any uncontested civil law suit under Japanese law solely based on the record that the incident had been reported and that the alleged perp didn't show for the trial. But the fact, she had allegedly contacted the upper echelons of both the Australian and US governments and had not received any answer doesn't ring. I know that the US military considers any such report seriously and would at a minimum require authorities at Yokosuka to provide an answer on the details of the investigation (and if it was reported as alleged, there would haved been a record of the inquiry). Any such report to the SecDef's office, or to a congressional member must by answered in a certain amount of time. This is a legal requirement, so if she contacted them, she should have received a detail reply within a prescribed period of time.

I do not know about the Australian Government, but with what I have read about their concern with citizens abroad, there should have at least been some reportable inquiry conducted.

Again, I not saying it didn't happen, nor making light of the offense of rape. It may just be that the writer was trying to mix in too much of an anti-military (government?) agenda and not enough facts about the incident.

Still, it just doesn't ring true to me.

[Socratesabroad]

This article just doesn't read right!

I was about to hang my head, once again embarassed for the American military when I read your comment - lo and behold, something does sound pretty fishy here.
You're absolutely right - the tone of the article is a bit slanted and the facts don't jibe...

[amdg]

You're absolutely right - the tone of the article is a bit slanted and the facts don't jibe...

Agreed, that's the first thing I thought when I read the precis.

[Mulboyne]

Since the story went up on Crisscross, one commenter has noted that the lawyer representing Wendy, Masahiko Goto, is Head of a Yokosuka group opposing the deployment and berthing of a nuclear aircraft carrier. I don't doubt that Wendy genuinely feels violated and aggrieved but, as Greji points out, her civil case was uncontested so that doesn't necessarily count as good evidence that the Japanese police or US authorities were negligent. With so much time having passed since the incident, it is difficult to know what legal remedies are actually open. If the alleged rapist had been an ordinary FG and not a member of the military, she would still be in the same position since, without charges, he would also have been free to leave the country. The focus, then, should probably be more on what standards a Japanese prosecutor requires to bring rape charges rather than the angle of unaccountable, out-of-control US sailors which is the thrust of this article.

[emperor]

Petty officer whatshisfaces like these should be shipped off to the bad end of Baghdad with nothing but a spoon to defend themselves with...

[blackcat]

1 shes a woman
2 shes a foreigner

in Japan 1 + 2 = nothing

[Mulboyne]

Stars and Stripes: Yokosuka spreading word about DOD-wide sex assault policy

YOKOSUKA NAVAL BASE, Japan It's a wallet-sized card handed to someone believed to have been sexually assaulted. It says: "You have the right to make a restricted or unrestricted report of the incident. Disclosure of any information to me or anyone else may result in the forfeiture of your right to choose between the two". Unrestricted reports trigger an investigation into the crime. A restricted report is kept within the protected circle while the victim decides if she or he wants to pursue an investigation. Victims sign a preference statement and can access health and medical treatment for their recovery. If nothing happens in a year, the evidence is destroyed or returned to the victim.

The change in reporting policy is another piece of the military's zero-tolerance stance on sexual assault, which kicked into high gear in 2001, Mandley said. Handing out the cards is one way to get the word out on the Department of Defense's victim's choice reporting policy, which changed last spring to allow servicemembers to make restricted reports. The military has always had the unrestricted reporting, but now we can give victims more control over what they want to do, Mandley said. We would like to see the perpetrator brought to justice, but the victim has a choice.

The policy is DOD-wide, but each installation is implementing it in different ways. "Here, we're talking about it on a daily basis," Mandley said of Yokosuka Naval Base. "And we're confident word is getting out"...But no matter what provisions are made, the number of assaults is always higher than the number of reports, Mandley said. "What few people who do come forward is not indicative of the number of sexual assaults we have," he said. At Yokosuka Naval Base, for example, the number of reported cases in any given year is usually between one and 10, Mandley said. There was one reported case in 2001 and seven cases each in 2002, 2003 and 2005. There were 19 in 2004 due to two groups of incidents that increased the numbers. So far in 2006, there have been two reported cases.

"We continue to aggressively educate people in Yokosuka about sexual assault reporting and prevention, and the word is out about this important issue," said base spokesman Bill Doughty. "There is absolutely no tolerance, absolutely no excuse for sexual assault."

[Mulboyne]

"Jane" was called "Wendy" in the original article in this thread

The Australian: Violated by Japanese justice

AFTER being dealt another bitter blow by the justice system yesterday, Jane seemed oddly jaunty: "I'm going to keep fighting. I'm fighting this not only for myself but for other women who've been raped"...Yesterday in the Tokyo District Court, the same court that found in November 2004 that she had been raped, Chief Judge Kenichi Kato and two colleagues ruled the Kanagawa police had acted within the law and fulfilled their responsibilities to the victim. "The case is rejected," he said brusquely. "Costs will be paid by the plaintiff." A woman in the courtroom began crying...more...

[Adhesive]

From my brief exposure to this story, it seems to me like her issue is more one of general jurisdictional problems and not any one government's handling of rape. Right?

[kurohinge1]

. . . In a civil lawsuit she filed to seek damages from the perpetrator, who was a crew member of the U.S. Navy's aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk, the Tokyo District Court recognized in November 2004 that the defendant raped her and ordered him to pay her 3 million yen . . .

It's important to keep in mind that in most countries, and I understand Japan is the same, there's a large gap between the standards of proof required for a criminal case vs. that required in a civil case (let alone a civil case where there's no opposition!).

Sadly, for women, if they choose to accompany a man to an isolated location - no witnesses - and in circumstances where there was, at least initially, some degree of consent (in accompanying the man), and the perpetrator denies the crime, then the police will not be able to prove "beyond reasonable doubt" that the crime was committed. I believe that this is where the lesson needs to be learned.

For a civil suit, it is only necessary to prove your case "on the balance of probabilities" (a much lower standard) - which is much easier to do if there's no one there on the other side denying your version of events.

So, it's no surprise in these circumstances that a civil suit would succeed but that the Court would also find that the Police were right in not pursuing the criminal charge.

As to the trouble in enforcing a foreign judgment debt, that is something that is faced often by many creditors around the world when a debtor flees the jurisdiction. If you locate the debtor, you then have to investigate that country's laws for registering foreign judgments - which countries & which Courts of those countries will have their judgment debts recognised. Further, such a proceeding may also require you to have the defendant served with the papers.

But will any of this equate to "justice" for what he's alleged to have done?

Whatever concept this woman has of justice in this world, she is letting this crime now ruin a significant part of her subsequent life. Rather than focusing on perceived inadequate responses after the event, why not try educating women to not put themselves in such dangerous situations in the first place? Such education may not only stop some rapes, but even save some lives.

----------

The one thing that struck me as odd was the possibility that she may have obtained a civil judgment where the defendant appeared to be outside the jurisdiction. Does the Japanese legal system allow you commence and continue civil law suits against a defendant without serving them with the papers??? Or was some form of substituted service allowed? Or was he in fact served?

[Mulboyne]

Compensation, 'but not justice', for Japan rape

AN Australian woman who was raped by a US navy sailor six years ago has finally won compensation - but not justice, she says - in the form of a payment of three million yen ($30,120) from the Japanese Government. The payment, which should have been made by the rapist following a civil court judgment, comes instead from a little-known Ministry of Defence fund for compensating civilian victims of illegal behaviour by US military personnel in Japan. "This money doesn't represent real justice to me," the woman, "Jane", told The Australian yesterday. "He should have paid that money, or the US military should have, not the Japanese Government. "I plan to go on campaigning to expose the truth about US military rape in this country and I will keep on looking for him." A Ministry of Defence official yesterday confirmed the settlement, which is believed to be the first paid from the fund to a foreign resident and one of only a handful to rape victims.

Jane, who cannot be identified under Japanese law, obtained a judgment in November 2004 from the Tokyo District Court that she had been raped by the sailor. It ruled she should receive an award of Y3million, plus costs. She took her own action against the man, identified in court documents as Bloke T.Deans, after Kanagawa district police refused to lay criminal charges following her complaint of being raped near the Yokosuka naval base, south of Tokyo, on April 6, 2002. Within two months of her suing Deans, he was discharged by US navy authorities and immediately left the country. This was not disclosed to Jane nor to the court for a further 11 months. The US navy has refused to take responsibility for Deans' absconding and she has been unable to locate him since.

Jane's lawyers sued the Kanagawa police on the grounds their botched investigation denied her proper justice and infringed her human rights. However, after a case lasting more than two years, Tokyo District Court in December ruled that the Kanagawa police had fulfilled their responsibilities to Jane, and rejected her Y11million damages claim. The reluctance of Japanese police to pursue investigations against US military personnel is well known. [Huh?] In two recent cases, an alleged gang rape in Hiroshima and an alleged sexual assault on Okinawa, police refusal to prosecute was followed by US military prosecutions.

[Greji]

Compensation, 'but not justice', for Japan rape

I think she just shot a fish in a barrel! Rape is great press for the J-fuzz and even if she was a FG, they would have probably pursued it big time if they believed there was the slightest chance of making a case.

The US Military will not hold anyone in country without notification of an investigation. If they receive that notification, the individual goes on International hold and is not released until the court is completed, even if he is scheduled to be discharged from the military.

Rape is a horrible crime and if it occurred as alleged, I feel truly sorry for her. But, this story still rings wrong. The case brought late, after the alleged perp had left town and pushed by an anti-base and anti-military group.

She made her dust on the fact that the J-cops did move on the case, not the rape as alleged.

Could be she just got away with freebee. It that is not the case, she didn't get enough...
JMTYW

[Takechanpoo]

[Huh?]

It seems that you too start to recognized uncivilized Aussie dudes try fabricating anything they can to lower Japan's reputation as C or K countries do.

[Adhesive]

I plan to go on campaigning to expose the truth about US military rape in this country...

Is rape by US servicemen typically covered up by the J-media?

[kurohinge1]

. . .The US Military will not hold anyone in country without notification of an investigation. If they receive that notification, the individual goes on International hold and is not released until the court is completed, even if he is scheduled to be discharged from the military. . .

Is that only for criminal matters?

[Greji]

Is rape by US servicemen typically covered up by the J-media?

"Typically"? You gotta be Ralphing me me. Just check out a few of the FG threads on that topic!

[Adhesive]

"Typically"? You gotta be Ralphing me me. Just check out a few of the FG threads on that topic!

That was my failed attempt at making a point.

[Greji]

That was my failed attempt at making a point.

Don't mind me, I'm just slow.

In regards to Kuro's question on International Hold. The military presents a different option. First, if she made a righous allegation of rape to the JNP, it would also be referred to the military authorities. Then if the j-police declined the jurisdiction, the military would continue their investigation to its natural conclusion. Just like the weird case that occurred at Iwakuni, the J-gal recanted, the j-police dropped further investigation, but the military court martialed the dude's ass big time.

If the event is a civil case, it is up to the nature and in some aspects, the merits of the case and it's impact on the military, whether hold is applied. Since the case in question puports to be a felony pursued in civil court, the individual would have probably been held in country and possibly even confined by the military until the military authorities satisfied themselves on the felony criminal aspect of the case.

But going back on this case, it was bungled (maybe) at the first, so apparently no record of a felony complaint existed and there is apparently some question whether it was actually lodged. When she came back with her back-up troops, so much time had lapsed up to the point where the dickee finally got her complaint lodged, the dicker had been transferred back to the states and had already left the service.

Therefore with the lack of record of the incident, she had a clean path around the bases on this hit. Whatever she said was gospel and pops just had to grin and bear it.

Also remember in this instance what Mulboyne and I posted earlier. It is almost automatic in Japan to obatain a favorable court decision if you sue, or otherwise bring suit against a person who does not respond to the courts summons and otherwise fails to appear in court. The dicker in this instance was out of the country, out of the military and out of the reach of the J-court, finding in favor of the dickee was a slam dunk (and I should again add, whether the allegation is true or not). From there, she had the clear ride to take on the J-cops for derilection now that she was armed with a uncontested court ruling that the dicker had applied his trade on the dickee(facilitated by the non-appearance/availability of the dicker, who may to this day not even know about the court summons).

[Mulboyne]

SMH: Australian rape victim loses court case

The Tokyo High Court on Wednesday rejected an appeal by an Australian woman who accused the Japanese police of "second rape" by mistreating her case in 2002. But she said she was resolved to take the case to the Supreme Court, continuing her fight for Y11 million in compensation. "I am very disappointed with the ruling," said the Australian, who uses the pseudonym Jane. "This is a matter that concerns not just me but also everyone in Japan." Asked if she would appeal again, she said, "Hundred per cent. I'm going up to the next step." The plaintiff was raped in 2002 by a then sailor of the USS Kitty Hawk aircraft carrier in the naval port city of Yokosuka, south of Tokyo. After prosecutors dropped the case without pressing a criminal charge against the sailor, she filed a civil case with the Tokyo District Court and won the right to seek compensation of Y3 million from her attacker. Before the district court made a ruling in that case, the sailor left the country without informing his lawyer. The compensation was instead paid by the Japanese government earlier this year.

The victim also sued the local government of Kanagawa prefecture, arguing its police had failed to fulfill their duties, such as preserving the rapist's sperm left in her body or taking her blood and urine samples. She said in court that police officers had forced her to take them to the crime scene before she could wash and had not allowed her to go to hospital immediately. The police demanded she pose for pictures to show how she had been raped, before releasing her 10 hours later, she said. "I had to force myself not to use the toilet for four hours after the incident while being questioned by the police," Jane told reporters. "It's a commonsense in Australia that a rape victim should not use the toilet until the evidence is sampled," she said. Judge Toshifumi Minami said in the ruling: "Even if it would have been preferable if police officers had paid more consideration (to the victim), the lack of consideration was not to the extent of violating the law." Jane's lawyer, Mami Nakano, criticised the ruling. "If this kind of idea is tolerated in society, it would hinder rape victims from reporting their cases to police," she said.

[Behan]

Keystone Cops.

Or whatever's worse than that.

You would think that some of the police there could have had some sympathy for a woman who had been raped.

[Mulboyne]

Japan Times: Rape victim fights for justice against U.S. military, Japan

Around the nondescript Tokyo suburb where she lives with her three children, Jane is a well-known face. Foreign in an area crowded with Japanese, she has taught English for years here among neighbors who greet her warmly on the street. Few know that her life is consumed by a fight against one of the world's most powerful military alliances, and a secret agreement that she says allows its crimes to go unpunished. In a room cluttered with the detritus of her seven-year struggle she tells her story, which begins with a violent sexual assault. On April 6, 2002, Jane was raped by American sailor Bloke T. Deans in a car park near the U.S. Yokosuka Naval Base southwest of Tokyo. Shocked and bleeding, she ended up in the small hours inside the local police station, where what she calls her second violation began.

During a 12-hour interview with a team of male cops that stretched into the middle of the next day, she was "mocked," refused food, medical aid and water, and treated like a criminal. Her demands for a container for her urine, which she believed contained the sperm of her attacker, were ignored until, crying with rage and frustration, she says she flushed the evidence of her rape down the station toilet. Then she was taken back to the car park, where she was forced to re-enact the assault for police cameras. Her ordeal was bad enough to be branded "one of the worst cases of police re-victimization I have ever seen" by John Dussich, President of the World Society for Victimology, but it was in some ways just beginning. Deans was quickly found nearby, aboard the giant U.S. aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk, then, for reasons that remain murky, released. He was demobbed and slipped out of Japan, under the protection, believes Jane, of the military and perhaps the Japanese authorities. He lives today as a civilian in the U.S. city of Milwaukee.

"The military deliberately discharged Deans knowing full well that there were charges against him," she says, drawing on the first of several cigarettes. She believes that Deans was let go to spare the U.S. Navy and its Japanese host embarrassment, forcing her to track him across America. "I'm not ever going to give up until justice is served, and that will happen when Deans faces me in court." Jane is one of hundreds of women assaulted by U.S. military personnel annually around the world, including in Japan, which is home to over 80 American bases and about 33,000 troops. The dense military presence is blamed for over 200,000 mostly off-duty crimes since the Japan-America Security Alliance was created in the early 1950s.

The bulk are petty offenses, but in one of the most notorious cases, a 12-year-old schoolgirl was raped and left for dead by three U.S. serviceman on the southern island of Okinawa, reluctant home to the bulk of U.S. military facilities in Japan. That 1995 crime shook the half-century alliance, sparking huge anti-US rallies and cries of "never again." The pleas were ignored: Last year a 14-year-old was raped by a U.S. Marine, one of several similar assaults against Japanese and Filipino women. Protests forced the U.S. military recently to set up a "sexual assault prevention unit." Opponents say, however, that the incidents are an inevitable consequence of transplanting young and often traumatized trained killers (many of the soldiers are veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars) among a local population they neither know nor respect. "There will be no peace here until the military is gone," says Okinawa anti-base campaigner Rev. Natsume Taira.

Tensions between locals and the military are exacerbated by extraterritorial rights enjoyed by US personnel under the Status of Forces Agreement, which often allows them to avoid arrest for minor and sometimes even serious crimes. The agreement was reinforced by a recently uncovered deal between Washington and Tokyo to secretly waive jurisdiction against U.S. soldiers in all but the most serious crimes, according to researcher Shoji Niihara. "This is despite the fact that both governments declared openly that Japan would have prime judicial rights of all off-duty crimes by U.S. soldiers (here)," he explains. The aim, Niihara believes, was to protect the reputation of the American military, which is underwritten by the Japanese government to the tune of about $2 billion a year.

Under pressure, however, from increasingly angry citizens, Japan has toughened its response to crimes by off-duty American soldiers. In 2006, Kitty Hawk airman Oliver Reese Jr. was sentenced to life imprisonment in a Japanese court for a robbery-murder, also in Yokosuka. The court heard that Reese repeatedly stomped on the head and body of Yoshie Sato, 56, rupturing her liver and kidney after she refused to hand over \15,000. He spent the money on a sex show. Sato's fiance, Masanori Yamazaki, who was initially treated as a suspect in the murder, welcomes the conviction but argues that Reese was given preferential treatment. "He was eligible for the death penalty but it wasn't considered." Yamazaki is angry at the failure to crack down on military crimes. "I believe that in trying to protect the Japan-U.S. alliance, the government is not protecting its citizens."

Last year, bureaucrats from Japan's Ministry of Defense offered Yamazaki a blank check as compensation for Sato's death. "They told me to fill in the amount I wanted. But they were going to demand the money from Reese's family. U.S. military personnel are poor people. It is the Japanese government that loans them the land and the U.S. military that employs them. They are to blame but they have absolutely no sense of responsibility." The offer of what some victims call "shut-up money" was made to Jane too, this time from a fund used by the Defense Ministry to compensate the victims of U.S. military crimes in Japan. The \3 million check equalled the unpaid amount awarded by a Tokyo civil court, which convicted her attacker in his absence in 2004. In search of further retribution, Jane sued her police tormentors, fighting all the way to an appeal in the Tokyo High Court, which ruled against her in December. She is liable for all legal costs.

"The financial and emotional burdens have been enormous," she admits, adding that she has repeatedly faced eviction from her house, and even postponed Christmas. "With my posttraumatic stress disorder, I've lost a lot of students as well. But at what point do you say, 'I don't care anymore'? I just can't do that." Lest she forgets why she is fighting, a poster of Deans captioned "Wanted for Rape" sits inches away. In an effort to publicize her case, and banish some ghosts, she has just written a book about her experience. Due for publication in April, the title comes from something a rape victim on Okinawa told Jane after she gave a speech there to an anti-base rally. "She said, 'I'm going to live my life from today.' That moved me." She continues to write letters to Japanese and U.S. politicians, including President Barack Obama, demanding they extradite her assailant and shine a light into a small but dark corner of the Pacific alliance. "My No. 1 priority is getting Deans on trial, but I'd also like to think that if I can help one person by somehow turning this horrific experience into something positive, it will be worth it. "You know, I was guilty until I could prove myself innocent; he is innocent until I can prove him guilty. How fair is that?"

"Jiyu no Tobira" ("The Door to Freedom") will be published in April by Ochanomizu Shobo.

[Adhesive]

Her demands for a container for her urine, which she believed contained the sperm of her attacker, were ignored until, crying with rage and frustration, she says she flushed the evidence of her rape down the station toilet.

How the hell would sperm get into her urine? I'm no urologist, but I think urine tests are only taken to check for evidence of date-rape drugs. No?

[Greji]

How the hell would sperm get into her urine? I'm no urologist, but I think urine tests are only taken to check for evidence of date-rape drugs. No?

I've commented on that article before. It has so many untruths in it and deviations from the actual wording and workings of the Japanese Law and SOFA, it is not even worth further comment. It has also been taken up by the anti-military groups and any chance of getting the real truth out of the incident is not of interest to them. They just see it as another way to attack the treaty and US Forces.

[Cyka UchuuJin]

1 shes a woman
2 shes a foreigner

in Japan 1 + 2 = nothing

100% correct. i was slipped a mickey a few years ago in the pig and whistle. fortunately managed to get back to my house before anything bad happened, but when i went to the police the next day, the only thing they were interested in was to see what i'd been wearing. my knee length skirt and non-form fitting jacket was deemed 'too sexy' because i was wearing high heels with it. case dismissed.

[Behan]

100% correct. i was slipped a mickey a few years ago in the pig and whistle. fortunately managed to get back to my house before anything bad happened, but when i went to the police the next day, the only thing they were interested in was to see what i'd been wearing. my knee length skirt and non-form fitting jacket was deemed 'too sexy' because i was wearing high heels with it. case dismissed.

It's unbelievable in the 21st century that those pigs would think they are qualified to make any judgement like that.

Glad to hear you got home alright.

It would be poetic justice if the guy was slipped the same thing some day and raped up the back side himself.

[Mike Oxlong]

Know a guy who got hit hard by a mickey. Was talking to a J-bird he knows at the bar one night, and she passed a drink to him. She got it given to her by some J-guy she wasn't interested in. So instead of refusing it, she passed it on to "Jim". Well, Jim goes home soon afterwards, but doesn't wake up for work the next day...in fact, he misses umpteen calls from his boss and co-workers wondering where the hell he is. I get a call from the landlady asking if I've seen him. Replied "no", then next thing I know she's opening his place with the master key. There he is, passed out in his tighty-whiteys on the floor of his kitchen. Took quite a lot to rouse him. He went to the doc, who told him he drank too much (not interested in testing for roofies).

[Cyka UchuuJin]

Know a guy who got hit hard by a mickey. Was talking to a J-bird he knows at the bar one night, and she passed a drink to him. She got it given to her by some J-guy she wasn't interested in. So instead of refusing it, she passed it on to "Jim". Well, Jim goes home soon afterwards, but doesn't wake up for work the next day...in fact, he misses umpteen calls from his boss and co-workers wondering where the hell he is. I get a call from the landlady asking if I've seen him. Replied "no", then next thing I know she's opening his place with the master key. There he is, passed out in his tighty-whiteys on the floor of his kitchen. Took quite a lot to rouse him. He went to the doc, who told him he drank too much (not interested in testing for roofies).

yep, that's the magic of the mickey. i know it was about 8pm when it got slipped to me, and i was supposed to have lunch with a girlfriend the next day. she turned up at 1pm and i didn't answer the door or my phone, so she let herself in with my spare key. i was on the sofa, fully clothed and it took her awhile to get me to come round too. she insisted that we go to the koban right away, which is right on the corner of my block. i had a really hard time staying awake while they interviewed me and just kept asking about what i was wearing. i even had the guy's phone number, but they weren't interested. my friend asked that i be tested for drugs and they just shrugged it off. i finally got tired of it all and just left.

but that's japan for you, they've got a 98% conviction rate, and that's because they only prosecute the cases they're 100% sure they can close on.

[Mike Oxlong]

Got to wonder how many "suicides" happen this way. "Jim" wasn't tiny by most standards...6'2" or thereabouts, and easily 110 kilo or better. If that dose would put a rhino like that down for nearly a day, what would it do to some poor, drunk J-waif?