Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Japanese landlords are demanding millions of yen in compensation from the families of suicide victims on the
grounds that the properties are difficult to let after someone dies in them.
But while the Japanese police and prosecutors are not widely accused of resorting to more aggressive forms of
interrogation such as torture, no-one outside the small interview room really knows what happens inside
because suspects' interviews take place behind closed doors - without an attorney.
"It is the king of evidence. If you can get someone to confess to a crime, the court is going to find them guilty,"
says Jeff Kingston of Temple University in Tokyo.
Japan has a conviction rate of over 99%, most of which are secured on the back of a confession.
"It is also seen as a chance given to a suspect to unburden his guilt and repent for his crimes."
If a suspect repents during the interrogation process, Professor Kingston says, prosecutors offer a lighter
sentence.
Despite Article 38 of the Japanese constitution, which guarantees an accused person’s right to remain silent, the
police and the prosecutors put maximum emphasis on obtaining a confession rather than building a case based
on evidence. The official view is that confession is an essential first step in rehabilitating offenders. Japanese
judges tend to hand down lighter sentences when confessions are accompanied by demonstrations of remorse.
Even more important, prosecutors have the right to ask for lenient sentences when the accused has been
especially co-operative.
It is how the police obtain these confessions that troubles human-rights activists. A suspect can be held for 48
hours without legal counsel or contact with the outside world. After that, he or she is turned over to the public
prosecutor for another 24 hours of grilling. A judge can then grant a further ten days of detention, which can be
renewed for another ten days.
Japan’s constitution also states that confessions obtained under compulsion, torture or threat, or after prolonged
periods of detention, cannot be admitted as evidence. Yet threats and even torture are reckoned to be used widely
in detention centres—especially as interrogators are not required to record their interviews. Accidental death
during custody happens suspiciously often. Facing up to a possible 23 days of continuous browbeating, or worse,
could persuade many wrongfully arrested people to accept their fate and sign a confession as the quickest way to
put the whole sorry mess behind them
In all, 13 men and women, ranging in age from their early 50s to mid-70s, were arrested and indicted.
Six buckled and confessed to an elaborate scheme of buying votes with liquor, cash and catered
parties. One man died during the trial – from the stress, the others said – and another tried to kill
himself.
But all were acquitted two months ago in a local court, which found that their confessions had been
entirely fabricated. The presiding judge said that the defendants had “made confessions in despair
while going through marathon questioning.”
fantical drive for linear materialistic status and success where prayer is around luck and prosperity
in this life. Is the essential materialistic religion that explains its dualistic paradoxical secular
religious character.[nico]
No Child Left Behind." "Race to the Top." The names suggest mobility, progress, moving on up and not falling
back. The goal of education, according to these national education initiatives with their standards and testing, is
forward motion and competitive advantage, progress and success, both in an unabashedly economic context.
President Obama talks about how we need to "invest in our young people" in order to compete in a global
marketplace.
In this context, Allison talks at some length about the Japanese social phenomenon of hikikomori, which began
to emerge in the early 1990s. Hikikomori are effectively non-spiritual late capitalist monks; male young adults
who "withdraw and remain in a single room they rarely, if ever, leave," sometimes for years. Generally hikiomori
are isolated in their family homes and remain dependent for minimal care on their parents, who they may not
even interact or speak with. Estimates of the number of hikikomori range between 100,000 and 700,00
The draft would exempt doctors from criminal and civil responsibility for halting life-prolonging treatment if a
patient is over 15 years old and has given consent in writing. Two doctors also need to agree the patient has
absolutely no chance of recovering.
Almost 46 million people are trapped in modern-day slavery, two-thirds of them in the Asia-Pacific region,
according to a study released Tuesday.
The Global Slavery Index for 2016 said an estimated 290,200 people in Japan, or 0.23 percent of the population,
This includes people trafficked for sex work or trapped in debt bondage and forced labor.
“There are concerning reports of involvement of highly organized crime in the Japanese sex industry, with well-
established links for recruitment into sending countries such as Thailand,” said report author Fiona David of the
The report also reflects long-standing allegations that a state-sponsored traineeship program locks foreign
It said Japan is among the richest nations doing the least about the problem within its borders. It ranked Japan
and Tajikistan.
Abe defends Japan's secrets law that could jail whistleblowers for 10 ...
https://www.theguardian.com › World › Japan
1.
Dec 10, 2014 - Under the new law, which was passed a year ago, civil servants who leak state secrets face up to 10
years in prison, while journalists who encourage whistleblowers to leak could get up to five years. The prime
minister, Shinzo Abe, said the law would be applied only to intelligence leaks that threatened ...
Let elderly people 'hurry up and die', says Japanese minister | World ...
https://www.theguardian.com › World › Japan
1.
Jan 22, 2013 - Taro Aso, the finance minister, said on Monday that the elderly should be allowed to "hurry up
and die" to relieve pressure on the state to pay for their medical care. "Heaven forbid if you are forced to live on
when you want to die. I would wake up feeling increasingly bad knowing that [treatment] was all ...