The amount of damages was up by about 4 million yen from the lower court ruling.
The plaintiffs included the company based in Yokohama, near Tokyo, CEO Masaaki Okawara, 76, former executive Junji Shimada, 72, and the family of former adviser Shizuo Aishima, who died at the age of 72 in February 2021 after being found to have stomach cancer while being detained.
Okawara, Shimada and Aishima were initially arrested in March 2020 by Tokyo’s Metropolitan Police Department. The Tokyo District Public Prosecutors’ Office later indicted them and the company on charges of illegally exporting a spray dryer that might be repurposed to make biological weapons, though the charges were withdrawn in July 2021.
Teruyoshi Ota, presiding judge at the high court, accepted the illegality of the investigations by the MPD and the prosecutor’s office, following the December 2023 ruling by the Tokyo District Court.
AloJapan.com