Tokyo police and prosecutors have formally apologised for the wrongful arrest and indictment of a man who died without ever being granted bail.
On 25 August, senior officials visited the grave of Shizuo Aishima, a former adviser to machinery maker Ohkawara Kakohki, in Yokohama, where his family members were present, to express regret for their role in a flawed investigation.
Aishima, detained in 2020 on suspicion of helping to export sensitive equipment, maintained his innocence until his death in 2021, according to the Kyodo News.
He had filed eight unsuccessful bail requests and was only released late in his illness to receive medical treatment, but he died in February 2021 before his name was cleared.
The apology followed the release of an internal report earlier this month that acknowledged a breakdown in the investigative chain of command, which had led to Aishima’s arrest alongside company president Masaaki Okawara and former director Junji Shimada.
While Okawara and Shimada were eventually cleared, Aishima’s prolonged detention and repeated denial of bail left him battling stomach cancer behind bars.
“We are sorry for the illegal investigation and arrest,” said Deputy Superintendent General Tetsuro Kamata of the Metropolitan Police Department.
The Tokyo High Court later ruled that the arrests and indictments of the three men were unlawful, ordering the state and the metropolitan government to pay 166 million yen in damages.
The court also criticised investigators and prosecutors for ignoring exculpatory evidence and for pursuing the case in violation of due process.
For Aishima’s family, however, the legal vindication came too late; he had filed eight unsuccessful bail requests before finally being released for medical treatment, only to succumb to cancer in February 2021. He was 72 at the time of his death.
At the graveside ceremony, senior officials, including Kamata, Takashi Koike of the Supreme Public Prosecutor’s Office, and Hiroshi Ichikawa of the Tokyo District Public Prosecutor’s Office, knelt and prayed.
Mr Ichikawa added: “We sincerely apologise for the serious human rights violation caused by illegally requesting his detention and filing a prosecution, and for depriving Aishima of opportunities for medical treatment by inappropriately rejecting his bail request.”
Aishima’s wife, who attended with their two sons, responded: “I accept the apology, but I will never forgive” the illegal arrest and indictment.
Her words marked the first time a bereaved family had agreed to receive an apology in connection with the Ohkawara Kakohki case.
The decision came only after police and prosecutors publicly released reports acknowledging deep failings in their handling of the investigation.
The Supreme Public Prosecutor’s Office admitted in its review that prosecutors failed to properly weigh evidence that might have cleared the men and that the process had lacked basic fairness.
In its own findings, the Tokyo police described the inquiry as one plagued by dysfunction at every level of command.
Last year in October, it was reported that Iwao Hakamada, once the world’s longest-serving death row inmate, received a personal apology from Shizuoka’s police chief for the nearly six decades of wrongful conviction and suffering he endured.
Hakamada, then 88, was acquitted in September last year after a retrial exposed fabricated evidence and forced confessions, finally ending his long fight to clear his name.
Shizuoka prefectural police chief Takayoshi Tsuda bowed deeply before Hakamada at his home, saying: “We are sorry to have caused you unspeakable mental distress and burden for as long as 58 years from the time of the arrest until the acquittal was finalised. We are terribly sorry.”
AloJapan.com