Japan | Family of ex-death row inmate seeks answers after authorities black out execution documents

FUKUOKA -- The family of a death row inmate who was executed while he was preparing to request a retrial has filed a civil lawsuit demanding full disclosure of documents relating to the execution, large portions of which the Japanese government blacked out.

The man, Michitoshi Kuma, was convicted of killing two elementary school students in the Fukuoka Prefecture city of Iizuka in 1992, in what came to be known as the Iizuka incident. His death sentence was finalized in 2006 and he was executed two years later at the age of 70. Kuma had protested his innocence and his family is now fighting the government seeking information on his execution, which they say was carried out too soon.

In September 2008 around two years after the death sentence was finalized, lawyers Tsutomu Iwata and Yasuyuki Tokuda met Kuma in a meeting room at Fukuoka Detention House. "If you don't request a retrial soon, the death sentence could be carried out," they warned him. Kuma showed them a list of death row inmates, including himself, with the dates their sentences had been finalized. Names of those already executed were crossed out. "I'm still about in the middle, so it's OK. There's still time so please proceed with the retrial request," Kuma said before leaving the meeting room.

However, only about a month later, on Oct. 28, 2008, he was executed.

The Code of Criminal Procedures stipulates that executions must be carried out within six months after the death penalty is finalized. But according to the Ministry of Justice and other sources, over the period from 2014 to 2023, the average time from the finalization of the sentence to execution was around nine years. Among the currently incarcerated inmates there is a case when the execution has been stayed for over 50 years.

The execution of Kuma, in comparison, was quick, being carried out after roughly two years and one month. Lawyer Iwata recalls, "At the time, the government was avoiding executing inmates when they were seeking retrials. Detention facility workers were present at the meeting, so the Ministry of Justice must have been aware of the details. Why, then, was the execution carried out so quickly?"

In January 2022, Kuma's bereaved family requested the disclosure of documents relating to the execution process. About two months later, the government released some documents, including a "Death penalty execution petition" addressed from the superintending prosecutor of the Fukuoka High Public Prosecutors Office to the minister of justice, an internal Ministry of Justice decision document titled "Regarding execution of the death penalty" and a "Death penalty execution report."

The documents show that the superintending prosecutor filed a petition for Kuma's execution to the justice minister on Feb. 7, 2007, about four months after his sentence was confirmed. On Oct. 24, 2008, the Ministry of Justice's Criminal Affairs Bureau drafted the execution, which was approved by 13 ministry officials. The minister of justice at the time then ordered the superintending prosecutor to carry out the execution, with the directive "Carry it out as per the court's ruling."

However, other parts of the documents were mostly blacked out. The document titled "Regarding execution of the death penalty" is said to have contained concrete deliberations on the appropriateness of the death penalty, but about nine relevant pages were totally blacked out.

The "Death penalty execution report," meanwhile, is believed to contain a chronological record of the procedures on the day of the execution and the condition of the former death row inmate, but that part too, was blacked out. The reason for this was said to be that those parts constituted "information where it is possible to identify a specific individual" and "information likely to cause impediments to the execution of punishment," which are subject to nondisclosure under Japan's information disclosure law.

Among the many inmates on death row, why was Kuma, who was preparing to request a retrial, chosen at that particular time, and how did he spend his final days? Dissatisfied with the documents full of redactions, Kuma's kin filed a lawsuit in the Fukuoka District Court in October 2023 requesting annulment of the nondisclosure decision. In the lawsuit, the family argues, "Despite being willing to waive our own privacy rights, the information was unilaterally withheld." The family further states the government's act unacceptably went as far as to conceal information that could help restore Kuma's honor, and that the nondisclosure was illegal.

The government, on the other hand, argued that if the process by which officials consider implementation of the death penalty becomes known, then other inmates might imagine that they are next and try to escape or kill themselves. It said all of the blacked-out parts constitute information subject to nondisclosure and is calling for the court to dismiss the family's suit.

Iwata, however, stated, "When the documents are blacked out, there is no way to verify whether execution of the sentence was appropriate. The information should be fully disclosed, not hidden."

Shinichi Ishizuka, a professor emeritus of criminal law at Ryukoku University, who is knowledgeable about Japan's death penalty system, stated, "Shedding light on the execution process is the starting point for discussing the existence of the death penalty system. Withholding information takes away the opportunity for debate, which is unacceptable. In the lawsuit, the question of whether disclosing the information could harm the public interest and the appropriateness of nondisclosure on the grounds of protecting the privacy of the former death row inmate, even when requested by the bereaved family, are likely to emerge as points."

The Iizuka incident

In February 1992, two first-year elementary school girls went missing in Iizuka, Fukuoka Prefecture. They were later found dead in the mountains of the prefectural city of Amagi (present-day Asakura). In September 1994, police arrested Michitoshi Kuma, who lived within the school zone. He consistently maintained his innocence, but he was convicted of murder and sentenced to death. His death sentence was finalized in 2006 and he was executed in 2008. According to the confirmed ruling, Kuma was convicted of abducting the two girls between about 8:30 and 8:50 a.m. Feb. 20, 1992 near a three-way intersection in Iizuka, strangling them by around 9 a.m., and disposing of their bodies in the mountains of Amagi around 11 a.m.

Source: mainichi.jp, Kazuya Shimura, Kyushu News Department, January 19, 2025

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