NAHA –
A high court on Thursday upheld a seven-year prison sentence given to a 23-year-old U.S. Marine charged with nonconsensual sexual intercourse resulting in injury to a woman in Okinawa Prefecture in May 2024.
Hiroaki Kikuchi, presiding judge at the Naha branch of the Fukuoka High Court, rejected the defense’s insistence that Lance Cpl. Jamel Clayton was innocent because the woman’s testimony was not credible.
“There is nothing unreasonable in the testimony, and it cannot be said that it is unnatural,” Kikuchi said.
The judge ruled that Clayton assaulted the woman on May 26, 2024, and put his arms around her neck from behind and choked her. She suffered injuries that took about two weeks to heal.
AloJapan.com