Japanese

 On September 26, 2024, the Shizuoka District Court handed down a not guilty verdict to Hakamata Iwao.

The Shizuoka District Court has acquitted Iwao Hakamata, who has been protesting his innocence for 58 years.

After 15 court hearings, Hakamata Iwao is finally set to be found not guilty.

Japanese law allows prosecutors to appeal to a high court against a verdict of not guilty. However, for the prosecutor to file an appeal in this case would be prolonging Mr. Hakamata's decision, which is clearly against justice and should not be allowed.

If the prosecutor were to appeal this acquittal to the High Court, it would have the effect of making Mr. Iwao Hakamata's relief far away.

Now is the time for people all over the world to raise their voices loudly asking prosecutors to give up on appeals.

 On March 13, 2023, the Tokyo High Court ruled to allow the start of a retrial in the Hakamada case, in which former professional boxer and death row inmate Iwao Hakamada is seeking a retrial after complaining of false accusations.

Mr. Hakamada has consistently pleaded his innocence since his arrest in August 1966, but the court sentenced him to death and fought all the way to the Supreme Court, but it was confirmed.

Since 1981, he has filed for a retrial, but the court has not granted it, and in 2014, the Shizuoka District Court finally approved the start of the retrial and released Hakamada for the first time in 47 years, stating that it was "intolerably contrary to justice."

The prosecutor immediately appealed this decision, so it was difficult to start the trial again, but in March of this year, the prosecution abandoned the special appeal to the Supreme Court due to the voices of a wide range of public opinion, including this signature site, and the decision to start the retrial became final and binding, and meetings for the retrial hearing began at the Shizuoka District Court in April.

However, the prosecutor did not immediately disclose the policy of proof at the retrial hearing, but extended it by three months and informed the court and defense lawyers that he would "prove guilty" on July 10.

The Shizuoka District Public Prosecutor's Office stated in its claim proof policy.

"Our policy is to plead and prove the guilt of the accused (Iwao Hakamada)."

I have clearly stated.

This is because prosecutors believe that Mr. Hakamada is still the culprit.

"Put it to death."

It means that you are saying.

This should not be allowed.

A retrial is said to be a retrial of a trial.

But a retrial is not a zero-based redo.

We must not forget that the "retrial has begun" because the court recognized "reasonable doubt" in the fact finding of the final judgment that Mr. Hakamada was the culprit at the retrial appeal hearing, and recognized the probability of an acquittal.

Prosecutors may think that their arguments have not been accepted and that they have "lost."

However, this is not the case.

"The start of a retrial is not a 'loss' for the prosecutor," said Professor Tsukasa Saito of Ryukoku University.

"The magnitude of the misfortune of an innocent person being wrongly prosecuted and convicted, its surprise, anger, suffering, pain, and sorrow, can only be conveyed to a person by spending a million words. Yet the innocent appeals of those who have been misjudged and their families tend to be low and reserved. But we must listen to the truth as much as we can from the complaints, grasp their suffering, assist them when necessary, and strive to correct miscarriages of justice. I think it is a human duty for the people and a professional duty for judges, prosecutors and lawyers involved in trials." (Toshiki Odanaka, "Miscarriage of Justice Relief and Retrial," Nihon Hyoronsha, 1982, p. 1)

Prosecutors, who are "representatives of the public interest" (Article 4 of the Public Prosecutor's Office Act), also have a professional responsibility to correct such miscarriages of justice.

If this is the case, what the prosecutor should do is not to prove guilt during this period, but to cooperate with the trial in order to promptly start the retrial and issue an acquittal as soon as possible.

Iwao Hakamata is now 88 years old, and his sister Hideko is 91 years old.

By Yoshiyuki Todate
Member of Hakamada Case Defense Team