와타나베渡邉 泰子는 일본의 명문 사립대학인 게이오 대학 경제학부를 졸업한 뒤 아버지가 다녔던 도쿄전력에 입사한 엘리트 사원이었다. 그녀는 1991년쯤부터 도쿄 번화가 시부야의 뒷골목에서 거리 매춘을 벌였다고 한다. 화려한 경력에 경제적으로도 부족함이 없던 그녀가 왜 매춘에 뛰어들었지는 지금까지도 미스터리로 남아 있다.
| 엘리트 여간부가 매춘녀로 나선 사연 |
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 | [205호] 2011년 08월 12일 (금) 21:44:26 | 도쿄·채명석 편집위원 |  |
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현재까지 나온 보도를 종합하면 매춘 현장에서 교살된 와타나베 야스코(살해 당시 40세)는 유복한 가정에서 태어나 게이오 대학 경제학과를 졸업한 재원이었다(관련기사 "원자력 반대하다 야쿠자에 죽었나" http://www.sisainlive.com/news/articleView.html?idxno=10980). 와타나베는 졸업과 함께 도쿄전력의 첫 종합직 여성 사원, 즉 간부 후보로 채용됐다.
입사 후 기획부에 배치된 와타나베는 경제지와 주간지 등에 논문을 활발히 기고했다. 그녀가 <주간 동양경제>에 발표한 복지목적세에 대한 의문, 공공투자의 재원 문제와 같은 논문을 읽어보면 장래가 촉망되던 신예 논객이었음을 잘 알 수 있다. 이런 활약에 힘입어 와타나베는 기획부 경제조사실 부팀장으로 승진했다.
그런 와타나베가 직장이 끝나면 곧바로 귀가하지 않고 시부야의 러브호텔 거리에 나타난 것은 1991년께, 서른 살 무렵이다. 그녀는 눈비가 오는 날이나 태풍이 부는 날을 가리지 않고 시부야에서 유객 행위를 했다. 목표는 하루 4명. 매춘 상대의 이름과 주소, 전화번호 등도 분명히 기록했다. 그리고 그날의 목표를 달성하면 와타나베는 막차를 타고 고급 주택가로 유명한 세타가야 구의 집으로 향했다.
와타나베는 토·일요일에도 쉬지 않았다. 예컨대 그녀는 토·일요일엔 시나가와에 있는 SM클럽으로 출근하여 오후 5시30분까지 일한 뒤 다시 시부야의 러브호텔가에 나타났다. 키가 167㎝에 달하는 늘씬한 미인이었기 때문에 하루 목표 4명을 달성하는 것은 그다지 어렵지 않았다고 한다.
그렇다면 왜 와타나베는 낮에는 도쿄전력의 엘리트 사원으로 근무하다가 밤이 되면 시부야의 언덕길에서 유객 행위를 하는 매춘부로 전락했을까. <도쿄전력 OL 살인사건>(사진)의 저자 사노 신이치 씨는 어머니에 대한 보복 심리를 그 이유로 든다. 와타나베의 아버지는 도쿄대학을 나와 도쿄전력에 입사하여 공무부 차장을 지내다 와타나베가 게이오 대학 2년 때 급사한다.
어렸을 때부터 아버지를 흠모해왔던 와타나베는 아버지의 급사에 큰 충격을 받는다. 그리고 야마나시 현의 몰락한 가정에서 태어난 아버지의 가계를 비웃던 명문가 출신 어머니에게 복수하리라 결심한다. 논픽션 작가 사노 씨는 어머니에 대한 그런 보복 심리가 매춘 행위로 발전했다고 추리한다. 그는 그 근거로 와타나베가 매춘을 한 뒤 반드시 집으로 귀가했으며, 어머니와 여동생은 그녀의 매춘 사실을 사건이 일어나기 훨씬 이전부터 알고 있었다는 점을 들었다.
이 사건은 당시 <워싱턴 포스트> 등 해외 언론에도 대서특필됐다. 즉 와타나베가 낮엔 도쿄전력의 엘리트 간부 사원으로, 밤엔 거리의 매춘부로 나선 것은 전통적인 ‘남성 우월 사회’에 대한 도전이며, 와타나베의 매춘 행위에 공감하는 일본 여성도 적지 않다고 보도했다. 해외 언론은 또 1심에서 무죄 판결을 받은 네팔인을 다시 무기징역에 처한 것은 일본 사회가 외국인 노동자를 ‘2등 시민’으로 취급하는 증거라고 지적했다.
Murder of Yasuko WatanabeFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Yasuko Watanabe (渡邉 泰子 Watanabe Yasuko?, June 7, 1957 – March 8, 1997) was a 39-year-old Japanese woman, a senior economic researcher at the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) moonlighting as a street prostitute by night. She fell victim to murder by strangulation[1] by an unknown assailant, and after being reported missing from home by her mother with whom she lived, her body was discovered on March 19, 1997[1] in a vacant apartment in the Maruyamachō neighborhood of Shibuya, Tokyo.[2] This was the regular neighborhood of her nightly activity. During the investigation it was discovered that she had kept a detailed journal of her many clients, including dates, times and fees.[3] Investigation[edit]Govinda Prasad Mainali (ゴビンダ・プラサド・マイナリ) (then aged 30), one of several Nepalese roommates sharing an apartment unit in the adjoining building, soon became targeted by the Japanese authorities as prime suspect. Although he was acquitted in the first trial from lack of conclusive evidence, he was subsequently convicted on appeal by the Tokyo High Court (Dec. 22, 2000[4]), and given an indefinite term (life) sentence. He went on to spend fifteen years in prison, until exculpatory sets of DNA evidence emerged linking an unidentified third man who had sexual and violent contact with the victim in the immediate hours before her death. Mainali was released in June 2012, and deported back to his native country, pending the retrial. More than the murder case itself, the victim's lifestyle was sensationalized as the downfall of an elite careerist from a well-to-do family. She was an economics graduate of the prestigious Keio University, earning nearly $100,000[note 1][3] from her regular job at the major utility firm. Her Tokyo University[5] graduate father also worked for TEPCO as an engineer, until he died during her attendance at college. In June 2012, the retrial was ordered by the Tokyo High Court in the face of new evidence that emerged the previous year. Swabs of semen recovered from inside the victim's body, which the prosecution claimed were too small a sample to analyze using existing technologies at the time, finally underwent DNA testing in July 2011, and ruled out Mainali as its owner. The semen's DNA matched a piece of body hair (pubic hair) from the crime scene already established to be from an individual other than Mainali. The DNA was further matched to the blood stain on the Burberry coat the victim was wearing, and the saliva found on the victim's chest.[6][7] The saliva on her breast was already known to be of O type blood (Mainali is type B), and the prosecution knew it did not match Mainali, but did not present the evidence at trial,[8] and withheld it from the defense attorneys until September 2011.[9] Japan does not have an equivalent of Brady disclosure rules as in the US, which would have made failure to disclose salient evidence to the defense censurable as prosecutorial misconduct. In 2005, the Supreme Prosecutor's Office revised its Code of Criminal Procedure requiring prosecutors to present a list of evidence gathered. But the revised code carries no penalties for violations thus offering little deterrent to prosecutors who may choose to withhold evidence.[10] Mainali was released shortly after a retrial was granted, but was quickly deported to Nepal by Japanese immigration authorities for his previous visa violation.[8][11][12][13] In November 2012, he was formally acquitted of the crime.[14] In 2013 Mainali was awarded ¥68 million as compensation for his wrongful imprisonment for 15 years.[15] Literature[edit]Noted nonfiction writer Shinichi Sano[ja] wrote a bestselling book, Tokyo Electric Power Co. Office Lady Murder Case (pub. 2000) following this case[3] social phenomenon. An appreciable segment of women in the workplace in Japan evidently identify with the victim's self-destructive urge to "sell their bodies" as a reaction to whatever psychological issues, dubbed "Yasuko syndrome",[3] or Tōden OL shōkogun(i.e. TEPCO Office lady syndrome), the title of Sano's sequel (2001). External links[edit]See also[edit]- Jump up^ 10 million yen converted to less than $100,000 using the exchange rate at the time (120 yen to the dollar)
References[edit]- ^ Jump up to:a b No byline (March 20, 1997). "Missing Tepco woman found slain". Japan Times.
- Jump up^ Sano, Shinichi (March 26 – April 1, 2004). "Something that he Never Did" (pdf). Nepali Times. pp. 13–.
- ^ Jump up to:a b c d Reitman, Valerie (March 19, 2001). "Japan's Case of the Unlikely Streetwalker". Los Angeles Times.
- Jump up^ Dixit, Kund (April 20–26, 2004). "Govinda" (pdf). Nepali Times. pp. 4–.
- Jump up^ Sano, Shinichi (佐野眞一) (2000). 東電OL殺人事件 (snippet). 新潮社., p.22, 60
- Jump up^ Editorial (June 12, 2012). "Don't delay justice any longer". Japan Times.
- Jump up^ No byline (June 7, 2012). "「第三者が殺害の疑い」 刑の執行停止も認める". msn 産経ニュース.
- ^ Jump up to:a b Matsutani, Minoru (June 7, 2012). "Mainali granted retrial, is let out of prison". Japan Times.
- Jump up^ Kyodo release (Sep 5, 2011). "New DNA tests eyed in '97 Tepco slaying as Nepal man seeks retrial". Japan Times.
- Jump up^ Matsutani, Minoru (June 14, 2012). "Mainali case exposes flaws, bias in judicial system". Japan Times.
- Jump up^ Tuladhar, Pratibha (June 16, 2012). "BRIEF: Nepalese man acquitted of murder in Japan returns home". NY Daily News (New York).
- Jump up^ Pokharel, Satosh P (June 16, 2012). "An emotional return home for 'Mainali". The Himalayan.
- Jump up^ Kyodo (Kathmandu) (June 17, 2012). "Freed Mainali returns to Nepal for first time in 18 years". Japan Times.
- Jump up^ "Nepal man cleared of Japan murder after 15 years in jail". BBC News. November 7, 2012.
- Jump up^ "¥68 million redress eyed for Mainali". The Japan Times. 25 May 2013. Retrieved 2 September 2015.
- ^ Jump up to:a b Ozaki, Eiko (尾崎英子) (February 7, 2011). "『追悼者』折原一著 思い込ませて罠にはめる". Fukuishimbun online. (book review of Orihara's mystery novel Tsuitōsha)
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1997년 발생한 도쿄전력 여성 간부사원 살해 사건의 진범으로 체포되어 무기징역형을 언도받고 15년간 복역 중이던 네팔인 고빈다 프라사드 마이나리(46)에 대한 재심 청구가 도쿄 고등법원에 의해 받아들여졌다. 이에 따라 마이나리는 네팔로 강제 추방됐다. 체포 당시 마이나리가 일본에 불법으로 체류하고 있었기 때문이다.
마이나리가 고난의 길로 접어든 건 도쿄 시부야 길거리에서 매춘 행위를 하던 도쿄전력 기획부 경제조사실부 팀장 와타나베 야스코(당시 40세)와 우연히 마주치면서부터이다. 마이나리는 네팔 동부 지방의 비교적 유복한 가정에서 태어나 27세 때인 1994년, 아내와 갓 태어난 두 딸을 카트만두에 남겨두고 혼자 일본으로 건너왔다. 도쿄 오다이바의 인도 카레점에서 점원으로 일하던 마이나리는 돈을 아끼기 위해 시부야의 한 허름한 아파트에서 네팔인 5명과 동거하고 있었다. 가게에서 받은 월급의 대부분은 꼬박꼬박 네팔로 송금했다고 한다. 그러다가 길거리에서 우연히 마주친 와타나베가 “화대를 반으로 깎아줄 테니 놀다 가요”라고 유혹하자 그 말에 이끌려 와타나베와 몇 차례 성 접촉을 갖게 됐다.
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ⓒ교도통신 무기징역형을 언도받은 고빈다 프라사드 씨의 가족과 지지자들이 6월7일 도쿄 법원 앞에서 재심 결정에 기뻐하고 있다. |
그 후 길거리에서 마주치면 인사를 건네는 정도였으나 와타나베가 도쿄전력 사원이라는 것은 새까맣게 모르고 있었다고 마이나리는 주장한다. 와타나베는 일본의 명문 사립대학인 게이오 대학 경제학부를 졸업한 뒤 아버지가 다녔던 도쿄전력에 입사한 엘리트 사원이었다. 그녀는 1991년쯤부터 도쿄 번화가 시부야의 뒷골목에서 거리 매춘을 벌였다고 한다. 화려한 경력에 경제적으로도 부족함이 없던 그녀가 왜 매춘에 뛰어들었지는 지금까지도 미스터리로 남아 있다.
“유죄판결은 외국인 차별”
일본 경찰은 1997년 3월19일(실제로 살해된 날은 3월8일) 시부야의 한 아파트에서 와타나베가 목 졸린 시체로 발견되자 살해 현장 부근 아파트에 기거하던 마이나리를 유력한 용의자로 체포했다. 우선 적용한 것은 불법체류 혐의였다. 경찰은 이어 마이나리가 사고 현장 아파트의 열쇠를 갖고 있던 점, 와타나베
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| 살해된 와타나베 야스코 씨. |
의 지갑에서 현금 4만 엔이 없어진 점 등을 중시하며 그를 강도살인죄로 체포했다.
재판이 시작되자 도쿄 지방검찰은 “아파트 변기 안에서 발견된 콘돔의 정액에서 마이나리의 DNA형이 검출됐다” “사건 현장에서 마이나리의 체모가 발견됐다”라는 점 등을 들어 그에게 무기징역을 구형했다.
그러나 도쿄 지방법원은 2000년 4월 “피고가 범인이라는 검찰의 주장을 뒷받침할 객관적 증거가 너무 희박하다”라는 이유를 들어 마이나리에게 무죄를 선고했다. 뜻밖의 무죄판결이 내려지자 검찰은 즉각 도쿄 고등법원에 항소했다. 고등법원이 검찰의 주장을 거의 그대로 받아들인 결과 8개월 뒤 검찰은 마이나리에 대한 유죄판결, 즉 무기징역형을 끌어내는 데 성공했다. 이어 2003년 10월 일본의 대법원에 해당하는 최고재판소가 상고를 기각함에 따라 마이나리에 대한 무기징역형이 확정됐다.
그러나 １심에서 무죄를 선고받은 마이나리가 ２심과 최고재판소에서 역전 유죄판결을 받자 일본의 재야 법조계와 시민단체는 ‘외국인 차별’이라고 반발하면서 그에 대한 구명운동을 벌이기 시작했다. 마이나리의 공판을 빠짐없이 방청하면서 이 사건을 <도쿄전력 ＯＬ 살인 사건>으로 펴내 큰 반향을 일으킨 논픽션 작가 사노 신이치씨는 “피고가 만약 백인이나 한국인 또는 중국인이었다면 일본 재판소가 과연 역전 유죄판결을 내릴 수 있었겠느냐. 마이나리는 일본이 제공하는 정부개발원조(ODA)의 최대 수혜국인 네팔인이었기 때문에 원죄(寃罪, 무고한 죄)를 뒤집어쓴 셈이다”라고 주장했다. 사노 씨는 또 이 책에서 “경찰이 마이나리를 진범으로 몰아가기 위해 네팔인 동료에게 폭행을 가하고 빚을 갚아준다고 회유하여 마이나리가 당시 돈에 쪼들리고 있었다는 거짓 증언을 얻어냈다”라고 폭로하기도 했다.
마이나리에 대한 구명운동이 널리 확산될 조짐을 보이자 일본인 변호인단은 2005년 3월 도쿄 고등법원에 이 사건의 재심을 청구하기에 이르렀다. 그로부터 7년3개월이 지난 6월7일 도쿄 고등법원은 마이나리에 대한 재심 청구를 받아들이기로 결정했다. 이유는 “최신 DNA 기술로 재조사를 실시한 결과 살해 현장에서 발견된 또 다른 체모와 와타나베의 몸에서 채취한 정액의 DNA형이 일치했다”라는 것이다. 말을 바꾸면 살해 현장에는 마이나리가 아닌 제3의 남자가 있었으며, 그가 와타나베를 살해했을 개연성이 더 크다는 얘기다.
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| 무기징역형을 언도받은 고빈다 프라사드 씨. |
도쿄 고등법원의 결정에 따라 마이나리에 대한 재심은 곧 시작될 예정이다. 이와 함께 마이나리에 대한 형 집행도 일시적으로 정지되어 그는 아내 그리고 대학생이 된 두 딸과 함께 18년 만에 네팔로 귀국했다.
꼬리를 무는 사법 스캔들
마이나리에 대한 재심 청구가 받아들여짐에 따라 일본 재판소와 검찰·경찰에 대한 신뢰도 크게 추락했다. 사노 신이치 씨는 <주간 아사히>에 게재한 기고문에서 “사법부도 경찰도 수치심을 자각하라”고 일갈했다. 사노 씨는 또 2003년 10월 마이나리에게 역전 유죄판결을 내린 도쿄 고등법원의 다카기 도시오 재판장의 과거를 폭로하기도 했다. 그가 사야마(狹山) 사건의 2차 재심 청구를 기각하고, 아시카가(足利) 사건의 항소심을 기각한 ‘악명 높은 재판관’이라는 것이다. 사야마 사건은 도쿄 근교 사야마 시에서 일어난 강도강간 살인 사건의 범인이 일본 사회에서 차별대우를 받고 있는 부라쿠민(部落民) 출신이었기 때문에 불법으로 체포되어 사형 판결을 받았다는 논란이 끓이지 않는 사건이다. 아시카가 사건은 살인과 유괴 혐의로 체포되어 무기징역형을 언도받은 범인이 재심을 청구한 결과 2009년 무죄 석방된 사건이다. 이들 사건을 모두 합치면 전후 일본에서 일어난 이른바 ‘원죄 사건’으로 사형이나 무기징역형을 선고받고 재심을 거쳐 무죄로 풀려난 사람은 8명(7건)에 달한다. 그럼에도 ‘원죄 사건’은 아직 끊이지 않고 있다.
사노 씨는 작년 3월 동북 지방을 휩쓴 대재해와 후쿠시마 원자력발전 사고, 사법 세계의 잇따른 신용 추락이 역사적 암합(暗合, 뜻하지 않은 일치)이라고 지적한다. 대재해와 원자력 사고로 인해 “일본은 무조건 안전하다”라는 신화가 여지없이 붕괴되었듯 꼬리를 물고 일어나는 사법 스캔들도 일본 사회를 지탱해온 상호 신뢰 관계가 급격히 무너져 내리고 있다는 현실을 일깨워 주는 증거라는 것이다.
그렇다면 누가 도쿄전력 여성 간부사원 와타나베 야스코를 죽였을까. 최악의 경우 그것은 어쩌면 마이나리에 대한 재심 청구가 받아들여진 6월7일 지하에서 때마침 55세의 생일을 맞이한 그녀만이 대답할 수 있는 질문으로 남게 될지도 모른다.
COLUMN onE
Japan's Case of the Unlikely Streetwalker
An economist moonlighting as a prostitute and the foreigner declared guilty of her death highlight overlooked aspects of the society.
March 19, 2001|VALERIE REITMAN |
TIMES STAFF WRITER TOKYO — The pair, whose lives would briefly intersect, were from different worlds.
Govinda Prasad Mainali was an illegal immigrant waiting tables in an Indian restaurant here, sending much of his salary home to his family in Nepal.
Yasuko Watanabe was a promising economist earning nearly $100,000 a year by day, but still driven to stand on a street corner and turn four tricks a night.
After the 39-year-old Watanabe was found slain in a seedy one-room apartment in 1997, Mainali was arrested and charged with the crime.
The case has captivated Japan, and not only because of its salacious details. It has exposed two long-overlooked aspects of Japanese society: the notoriously tough judicial treatment of foreigners and the peculiar attitudes toward prostitution.
Mainali, who admits to having had sex with Watanabe but insists he didn't kill her, was judged not guilty by a lower court that cited a lack of evidence. Nevertheless, authorities refused to let him out of jail while prosecutors appealed, something that Mainali's lawyers say has never happened to a Japanese.
With no new evidence and no clarification beyond an assertion that there was no doubt about his guilt, an appeals court overturned the ruling in December and sentenced Mainali to life in prison.
Mainali, 33, shivers in the cold solitary-confinement cell where he has been held for nearly four years, unable to see his wife and two young daughters. "I'm innocent. I didn't do anything wrong," he recently told visitors.
"It was the murder of the law by the guardians of the law," said Shinichi Sano, a well-respected journalist and author. His book about the killing, "Tokyo Electric Power Co. Office Lady Murder Case," has climbed the bestseller list.
Prosecutors and police refused to comment.
Meanwhile, widespread publicity continues to trigger sympathy for the victim's involvement in prostitution. A seminar last month, "Backstage in the Cinderella Story," drew about 800 well-heeled participants, some of whom said they had either sold or been tempted to sell their bodies. The urge has been dubbed the "Yasuko Syndrome," after Watanabe.
Women regularly visit Tokyo's Maruyamacho area of "love hotels," which are designed for trysts, to lay fresh purple orchids or pray at a small shrine known unofficially as Yasuko Jizo. It is a stone statue of a woman, her mouth painted with fresh lipstick.
Several women at the "Cinderella" symposium said that, as with Watanabe, money was not behind their urge to offer themselves for sale. The women said they craved something else that's less clear. Mayumi Watanabe, 29--no relation to Yasuko--said she had felt driven to take money for sex with men she dated, but then felt miserable.
Some observers suggest that many Japanese women have a hard time relating to men because typically onerous working hours and commutes keep fathers largely absent from their families. Moreover, sex here seems to have little context: Though pornography is ubiquitous--nude pictures appear in newspapers openly read on subways--there is no sexual education in schools, and Shinto and Buddhist religions serve more as philosophies than moral compasses.
Single professional women have a particularly tough lot in Japan because they fit into neither the overwhelmingly male professional world nor the traditional world: Those who do work are expected--and prodded--to marry, have children and leave the work force.
Victim Attended Prestigious University
Yasuko Watanabe was born in 1957, grew up in a well-to-do Tokyo neighborhood and attended prestigious Keio University, where she majored in economics. Her father died of cancer while she was in college. She felt a strong obligation to support her mother and sister.
Driven and goal-oriented, she followed in her father's footsteps to Tokyo Electric, one of only nine women hired in 1980 and among the few on the company's "career track." Nevertheless, like all women in the firm, she was required to wear a uniform, although the men were not. She detested making tea for her male colleagues and bosses, as female employees in Japan--no matter how successful--typically are required to do.
Her downfall seemed to have been triggered by jealousy over a female rival's selection to attend a program at Harvard University, author Sano said.
When the utility lent Watanabe temporarily to a quasi-governmental think tank a few years later, she considered it a demotion. She wanted a more prestigious appointment in the Foreign Ministry or Ministry of International Trade and Industry, Sano wrote. Nevertheless, a paper of hers on structural changes in household economics won her acclaim within the institute.
Her professional success didn't deter her from doubling at night in a hostess bar, where men pay high prices for women to flirt with and pour drinks for them.
영어사전- detest
- 미국·영국 [dɪ|test]
영국식 예문보기학습정보 - 몹시 싫어하다, 혐오하다
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/mar/08/worlddispatch.japan
Japanese justice goes on trial
The conviction of a Nepalese worker for the murder of a Tokyo prostitute has raised serious questions about the treatment of foreigners in Japan, writes Jonathan Watts
Jonathan Watts
Thursday 8 March 2001 13.18 GMT Last modified on Monday 12 March 2001 13.18 GMT
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In 1997, the very different paths of Yasuko Watanabe, a 39-year-old "office lady" and Govinda Prasad Mainali, a 34-year-old Nepalese restaurant worker, crossed with sordid and tragic consequences.
Shortly after they met, Watanabe's body was found in a deserted building near Mainali's apartment and the Nepalese man was arrested for murder.
Watanabe had led an exceptional double life: by day, she was a high-flying economist for one of Japan's most prestigious companies; by night, a prostitute who turned tricks in Tokyo's sleazy Shibuya district.
She walked the streets in Murayama-cho, an area filled with love hotels. Each night after finishing at the office of Tokyo Electric, the graduate from the elite Keio university would have sex with customers in cars, parks or hotel rooms.
According to the extensive domestic reportage on the case, she touted for business in a long wig, swigging beer and calling out to businessmen, "Do you want to play?"
A methodical worker, she kept a detailed record of her clients inclding their names and how much they paid.
It suggests that she was a Robin Hood of hookers who would charge Japanese businessmen up to £300, but only a tenth of this amount to clients from developing nations.
Mainali had sex with her on at least two occasions, but any gratitude he might have initially felt at the charitable price must have soon turned to a wish that he'd never met her.
He was arrested and tried for murder, the two main pieces of evidence being a condom containing his semen and a pubic hair found near the body, though other unidentified hairs were also found nearby.
In April last year, a lower court acquitted Mainali, saying the case against him was flimsy and circumstantial. The judge accepted that the two condom and hair could have been left during a previous liaison.
This was a stunning decision in a country where 99.8 per cent of criminal trials end with a conviction, but it did not provide relief for Mainali. As he was preparing to leave his cell, prosecutors won a new order to have him jailed so that he could not leave the country while they appealed the ruling.
This imprisonment of a man declared innocent sparked a furious response among human rights groups.
"It's not possible, legally, to detain a person who has been acquitted, but they did it anyway," Hideki Morihara of Amnesty International told the Washington Post. "It's a breach of Japanese law and international law."
The outrage grew in December, when a high court reversed the previous decision and sentenced Mainali to life imprisonment even though no new evidence had been presented by the prosecution.
"The victim worked for a major company and held a high position," said the presiding judge as the Nepalese man screamed out his innocence.
In their coverage of the case, newspapers have been largely sympathetic towards Mainali and printed rare criticism of Japan's legal system by lawyers and human rights groups.
"The system is rotten. The criminal courts are comatose: they do what the prosecutors tell them," said Katsuhiko Tsukuda, one of the lawyers defending Mainali.
According to Shinichi Sano, author of a book on the "Office Lady Murder", the high court's decision is based on fabricated depositions and ambiguous material evidence.
"With this case, the Japanese legal system has committed suicide," Sano said. "The ruling was influenced by the unconsciously held racial prejudice of the Japanese against a foreigner from an Asian country to which Japan provides large sums of economic aid.
"Just as the confused behaviour of Watanabe exposed the dark side of Japanese society, so the unfair treatment of Mainali has exposed the dark sides of the Japanese legal system."
Email
jon.watts@theguardian.com
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Useful links
Japan Times online
Website of the prime minister of Japan and his cabinet
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Aspects of Japanese Culture and Society
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미국·영국 [ə|kwɪt] 영국식 예문보기1. 무죄를 선고하다 2. 잘, 잘못 처신하다 등comatose 미국식 [|koʊmətoʊs] 영국식 [|kəʊmətəʊs] 예문보기
1. 혼수상태인 2. 완전히 탈진한; 정신없이 잠이 든
deposition 미국·영국 [|depə|zɪʃn] 영국식 다른 뜻(1건) 예문보기
1. 퇴적; 퇴적물 2. (특히 통치자를 권좌에서) 물러나게 함 3. 증언 녹취록
Mysterious murder of TEPCO’s Executive who was a lover of President Katsumata
After Japan met the catastrophe ‘Tohoku Earthquake 2011’ on Marth 11th 2011, there was a big news about the past murder case of TEPCO‘s executive, Yasuko Watanabe who was a lover of TEPCO’s president Mr.Katsumata, the member of the cult SGI (Soka Gakkai). Anyhow, this murder happened only in 1997 and a Nepali, Govinda Prasad Mainali was arrested in suspicious way. That’s why mass media suddenly repeated this case after the Tohoku Earthquake 2011 which caused Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Disaster.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Yasuko_Watanabe
I was deeply impressed by this case of TEPCO’s executive death. In internet, people talked curiously about her, because she was a rich executive of rich TEPCO, Yasuko Watanabe’s annual income was more than 100,000 US dollars. But news treated her just as a Pink collar worker who was also working as a prostitute at the night. After this murder case of Yasuko Watanabe 1997, several books and films, even a TV serialexpressed her strange life and death.
After some month of the Earthquake 2011, I searched the news of the murder of Yasuko Watanabe again. Strange enough… I could not find the news with the matter as ‘she was Katsumata’s lover’ any more… I felt TEPCO’s President Katsumata did something to control mass media with money and mafia as many other Japanese guessed so. Yasuko Watanabe’s father was TEPCO’s executive, too. He was known that he was strongly against NUCLEAR POWER PLANT but he died due to cancer. His daughter Yasuko Watanabe was employed by President Katsumata himself. But she was like her father, intelligent lady and she was proposing GEOTHERMAL ELECTRIC POWER Generation.
In the same year of the earthquake, 2011, it was found that Yasuko Watanabe was killed by unknown but a Japanese mafia, YAKUZA. Govinda Prasad Mainali was released after 15 years. Yet, the real criminal has not been found.
BBC News about Govinda Mainali – Nepal man cleared of Japan murder after 15 years in jail
JAPAN Times about Govinda Mainali in Egnlish – Mainali eyes wrongful imprisonment suit against Japan
Secrets of the murder of Yasuko Watanabe in Japanese
