Kumamoto Court Denies Retrial over Special Court in Leprosy Facility

Kumamoto, Jan. 28 (Jiji Press)–Kumamoto District Court on Wednesday dismissed the fourth appeal for a retrial of the case involving a special court within an isolated facility where a man deemed to have leprosy was sentenced to death in the 1950s. While the district court acknowledged the unconstitutionality of the special court, it concluded that this could not serve as grounds for a retrial. The defense attorneys plan to immediately appeal to Fukuoka High Court. In 1952, the man was charged with fatally stabbing a former official of a village in the northern part of Kumamoto Prefecture. The victim had reported to the prefectural government that he was a leprosy patient. Although the man asserted his innocence, his death sentence was finalized in 1957 and carried out in 1962. Over the case, former leprosy patients filed a damages lawsuit against the government, and in 2020, the Kumamoto court ruled that proceedings at the special court were discriminatory and lacked rationality. This was the first ruling to find the special court unconstitutional. In Wednesday’s ruling, Presiding Judge Masato Nakata said that the special court was discriminatory and unconstitutional, but added that the unconstitutionality of the special court did not necessarily affect the death sentence. In the retrial appeal, the attorneys also claimed the man’s innocence. However, the court rejected this claim as well. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]