- Shaimaa Khalil & Simon Fraser
- BBC News
image source, AFP
Iwao Hakamada, pictured with his sister Hideko in 2019. He was released from prison in 2014.
A new opportunity to clear his name.
A Japanese man who was on death row for nearly half a century has been granted a new trial.
Iwao Hakamadanow 87, is the world’s longest-serving death row man, according to Amnesty International.
He was convicted in 1968 for allegedly murdering his boss, his wife, and the couple’s two children a year earlier.
The former professional boxer confessed after 20 days of interrogation during which he said he was beaten. Later retracted the confession in the court.
Human rights groups have criticized Japan’s judiciary’s reliance on confessions, which they say police often extract by force.
At the new trial, the judges will decide whether the DNA from the bloodstains found on the clothing allegedly worn by the killer matches that of Hakamada.
Meanwhile, the defendant’s lawyers argue that the evidence is fabricated.
image source, AFP
Hideko Hakamada shares a smile with a lawyer for her brother outside of court.
The arrest
Hakamada was arrested and charged with robbing and killing his boss and his family at a soybean processing factory in Shizuoka, west of Tokyo, in 1966.
The victims were found stabbed to death after a fire.
In 2014, Hakamada was released from jail and granted a new trial by a district court, finding that investigators in his case may have fabricated evidence against him.
The decision was later overturned by the Tokyo High Court.
But, after an appeal, the Supreme Court judges ordered the High Court to reconsider the case, leading to the decision that a new trial must be held.
“I have been waiting for this day for 57 years and it has come,” said Hakamada’s sister, Hideko, 90, who has campaigned on her brother’s behalf for years.
“A weight has finally been lifted off my shoulders.”
image source, AFP
Iwao Hakamada’s family says his mental health has deteriorated after decades in prison.
Japan is the only industrialized democracy other than the US that still implements the death penalty.
Celebrate the new trial
Amnesty International welcomed the new trial, saying it is a “long-awaited opportunity to do justice.”
“Hakamada’s conviction was based on a forced ‘confession’ and there are serious doubts about the other evidence used against him,” said the group’s Japan director, Hideaki Nakagawa.
However, the process for a new trial could take years if a special appeal is filed.
The defense welcomed the ruling, but asked prosecutors to “quickly start the retrial process without issuing a special appeal to the Supreme Court.”
“We cannot afford any further delay in redressing Mr. Hakamada, who is aged 87 years old and suffers from mental and physical problems after 47 years of physical restraint,” said Motoji Kobayashi, head of the Japan Federation of Bar Associations.
image source, Getty Images
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