Capital punishment in Japan

Overview of capital punishment in Japan

Capital punishment is a legal penalty in Japan. In practice, it is applied only for aggravated murder, but the current Penal Code and several laws list 14 capital crimes, including conspiracy to commit civil war; conspiracy with a foreign power to provoke war against Japan; murder; obstruction of the operation of railroads, ships, or airplanes resulting in the death of the victim; poisoning of the water supply resulting in the death of the victim; intentional flooding; use of a bomb; and arson of a dwelling; all resulting in the death of the victim. Executions are carried out by long drop hanging, and take place at one of the seven execution chambers located in major cities across the country. Death sentences are usually passed in cases of multiple murders, although there have been some extremely grave cases where individuals who committed a single murder have been sentenced to death and executed, such as those involving torture, extreme brutality or kidnapping with a demand for ransom. Since 2000, 98 inmates have been executed in Japan, with the most recent being the execution of Tomohiro Katō, the perpetrator of the Akihabara massacre in 2008, who was executed on 26 July 2022. There are currently 107 death row inmates awaiting execution. Support for capital punishment has consistently been high among the Japanese public. In a poll conducted in November 2019 of 3,000 Japanese adults by the Cabinet Office, 80.8% of respondents stated they support the continued usage of the death penalty in Japan, while 9% stated it should be abolished in all cases. When the question proposed the introduction of life sentencing without parole, 35.1% answered that the death penalty should be abolished, while 52.0% said it should continue. Actual support for the retention of the death penalty in Japan is likely less than what polls suggest due to the use of leading questions. Japan is one of four developed countries to continue the death penalty. It is the third most active developed death penalty country, after Singapore, and the United States. Japan and the United States are the only two out of the "Group of Seven" nations that carry out capital punishment.

According to the Kojiki, Japan's oldest historical book, the death penalty is believed to have first appeared in Japan in the first half of the 5th century during the reign of Emperor Nintoku. Methods of execution during this period included strangulation, beheading, and burning to death, and in some special cases, the death penalty was carried out and then exposed to public view. The Taihō Code and the Yōrō Code stipulated two methods of capital punishment: beheading and strangulation. In 773, the method of beating to death was added for arsonists and thieves, bringing the total to three methods of capital punishment. The execution of the death penalty required the approval of the emperor. However, such sentiments would see a sharp reversal after World War I as the country descended into militarism up to World War II, and after the country's defeat, continuing towards post war Japan until today. Today, executions in Japan are carried out by long drop hanging, which is intended to cause death by breakage of the neck.

According to Article 475 of the Japanese Code of Criminal Procedure, the death penalty must be executed within six months after the failure of the prisoner's final appeal upon an order from the Minister of Justice. However, the period requesting retrial or pardon is exempt from this regulation. Therefore, in practice, the typical stay on death row is between five and seven years; a quarter of the prisoners have been on death row for over ten years. For several, the stay has been over 30 years (Sadamichi Hirasawa died of natural causes at the age of 95, after awaiting execution for 32 years).

Japanese death row inmates are imprisoned inside the detention centers of Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya, Sendai, Fukuoka, Hiroshima and Sapporo. Despite Tachikawa and Takamatsu having high courts, neither city has a detention center equipped with execution chambers; executions imposed by the Tachikawa and Takamatsu High Courts are carried out in the Tokyo and Osaka Detention Centers. Those on death row are not classified as prisoners by the Japanese justice system and the facilities in which they are incarcerated are not referred to as prisons. Inmates lack many of the rights afforded to other Japanese prisoners. The nature of the regime they live under is largely up to the director of the detention center, but it is usually significantly harsher than normal Japanese prisons. Inmates are held in solitary confinement and are forbidden to communicate with their fellows. They are permitted two periods of exercise a week, are not allowed televisions and may only possess three books. Prison visits, both by family members and legal representatives, are infrequent and closely supervised. As of 21 December 2021, 107 inmates currently sit on death row awaiting execution. In Japan, until the 1970s, the date of execution was announced to the condemned prisoner before the execution. However, because there were cases of death row inmates committing suicide before the execution, the method was changed to one or two hours before the execution to ensure the emotional stability of the inmate. The method of hanging is the long drop, causing instant unconsciousness and rapid death by neck fracture.

Having signed both the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which forbid any executions for those under the age of 18, Japan sets the minimum age for capital punishment at 18 (Juvenile Law § 51). Prior to April 2022, the age of majority in Japan was 20 years of age (as per 1876 legislation). Although death sentences for minors aged 18 or 19 years were rare, those who committed capital crimes at those ages could be legally sentenced to death. Between 1966 and 2022, nine juvenile criminals received death sentences that were finalized: Misao Katagiri, Kiyoshi Watanabe, Mitsuo Sasanuma, Fumio Matsuki, Sumio Kanno, Tsuneo Kuroiwa, Norio Nagayama, Teruhiko Seki and Takayuki Mizujiri. Eight of them have already been executed and Watanabe, who killed four people when he was 19 years old, remains on death row awaiting execution. Another one of the juveniles, Takayuki Fukuda, was sentenced to hang by the Hiroshima High Court on 22 April 2008, and upheld by the Supreme Court on 20 February 2012. A month after his 18th birthday, he killed and then raped a woman, along with murdering her baby. On 18 January 2024, Yuki Endo was sentenced to death by the Kofu District Court for murdering the parents of his love interest and setting fire to their home in Yamanashi prefecture on 12 October 2021, thus becoming the most recent case of a minor facing the death penalty in Japan. Endo, who was 19 at the time of the double murder, was the first minor to be given the death sentence since Japan lowered the legal adulthood age to 18 in April 2022. On 2 February 2024, Endo's death sentence was finalized after Endo himself withdrew the appeal to the High Court, which was filed by his lawyer.