Readers in Council,
The JapanTimes,
5-4, Shibaura 4-chome,
Minato-ku, Tokyo 108-0023
I am not a death penalty opponent. But the story “Mom, son’s death sentences upheld” (December 26, 2007) seems to describe such a surprisingly low level of capital punishment protocol in this country that is already infamous for its execution protocol (i.e. hanging inmates without warning, hanging inmates with no public announcement, hanging inmates on nothing but circumstantial evidence, hanging inmates on Christmas Day) that I am moved to suggest that the featured story effectively broadcasts the argument for commutation of death sentences into permanent imprisonment. The story describes the Kitamura family of four (parents plus two sons) who have all been sentenced to death by the Fukuoka High Court for crimes dating to September 2004. I don’t doubt that the family are truly guilty of the murder and conspiracy charges they were convicted of. But even if they are a truly repugnant (not to mention ridiculously dysfunctional) family who were afforded all due process of the law, I do not want to believe that the government of Japan would actually terminate an entire family line from the face of the Earth by hanging them all in some kind of perversely cruel bid to save society. Of course, this is Japan and that is exactly the kind of thing that I do expect of the government here. But I still do not want to believe it. The Kitamuras may be heinous people indeed, but in this instance I would like to see them imprisoned for life.