Japanese court begins review process for man on death row for 1961 murders

The Nagoya High Court said Monday it has received papers on an 84-year-old death row inmate, convicted of killing 5 women and injuring 12 others with poisoned wine, that it needs to start a review of its earlier decision concerning the high-profile murder case in Mie Prefecture in... 1961.

The court said the arrival of records from the Supreme Court on Masaru Okunishi, who has been on death row since 1972, marks the beginning of a reconsideration of the case, after the top court decided to send it back to the high court on April 5.

But it is expected to take a few more months for a retrial to begin in earnest as judges need time to read through the documents and decide on a trial plan in discussion with the prosecution and the defense team.

The focus of the trial will be on whether the type of agricultural chemical that Okunishi allegedly confessed to using was indeed in the wine.

Okunishi was arrested in April 1961 for allegedly poisoning 17 women in March that year at a local community meeting in Nabari, Mie Prefecture. 5 of the women, including his wife, died and 12 fell ill. He allegedly confessed to investigators that he had laced the wine with an agricultural chemical.

Okunishi retracted his confession shortly before his indictment. In 1964, the Tsu District Court acquitted him, citing lack of evidence.

But the Nagoya High Court overturned the lower court decision and sentenced him to death in 1969a decision upheld by the Supreme Court in 1972.

Okunishi has since applied a total of 7 times for a retrial and been refused 6 times. On his seventh attempt, the Nagoya High Court decided to reopen the case in 2005, citing new evidence that could prove his innocence and ordered his execution to be suspended.

But prosecutors filed an objection, and a separate 3-judge panel at the high court repealed the previous decision.

The court rejected the defense team's argument that the type of pesticide that Okunishi said he used was not actually used in the deaths because its characteristic component was not detected in the wine. In 2007, the defense filed an appeal with the Supreme Court.

Source: Japan Today, April 20, 2010