Japan Govt Presents Draft of Retrial System Revision

Tokyo, Dec. 16 (Jiji Press)–Japan’s Justice Ministry presented a draft plan to revise the retrial system at a meeting of a subgroup of the Legislative Council on Tuesday. The ministry included two options on each of the major topics where there are major disagreements in the council, such as the scope of evidence disclosure in a retrial request hearing and the prohibition of appeals by prosecutors against a court decision to start a retrial. Meanwhile, the ministry made concrete proposals on procedural provisions, over which a broad consensus had been built. It has been effectively decided that provisions be established to enable courts to order prosecutors to submit evidence they hold after considering the necessity and possible adverse effects from submission. But on the scope of evidence disclosure, the ministry presented the options of limiting it to proof directly related to the reason for a retrial request and accepting a wider range of evidence. The ministry also proposed prohibiting prosecutors from lodging appeals against a court decision to start a retrial or accepting such appeals as under the current system. Lawyers demand prohibition, saying that such appeals led to prolonged hearings in the retrial case of Iwao Hakamata, who was sentenced to death for the 1966 murder of a family in Shizuoka Prefecture but acquitted in a retrial in 2024. But scholars and prosecutors remain cautious on the matter, saying that appeals by prosecutors should not be banned in an important decision that could overturn a final verdict. The draft also included two proposals regarding judges to be involved in retrials–one that calls for excluding judges who oversaw original trials or appeal request hearings for a retrial and the other that does not. According to the ministry, progress has been made over proposed provisions to speed up court proceedings. Under the provisions, courts would be required to examine reasons for retrial requests immediately and quickly dismiss the requests if they are found to be groundless. Also included in the draft were a scheme to start retrials if there are reasons courts find appropriate and a provision requiring the designation of a specific date for the end of a retrial. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]