By The Straits Times | Created at 2026-06-18 09:26:39 | Updated at 2026-06-18 13:49:29
4 hours ago
TOKYO – The mother of a 16-year-old girl who died from emaciation following lengthy detention and menacing interrogations by Japanese authorities is seeking compensation, in the latest so-called “hostage justice” case.
Emaciation refers to the state of being very thin and weak, often due to illness or lack of food.
The lawsuit, filed with western Japan’s Kobe district court on June 17, argues that the girl’s 18-day ordeal at a jail traumatised her so much that five months after her release, she weighed just 20kg – and died in December.
“My daughter was unrecognisable when she died,” the mother of Runa – a pseudonym used in the complaint – told a news conference on June 17.
“I want to know what happened to her, and why she was arrested, detained and had to die,” the plaintiff said.
In Japan’s harsh criminal justice system, critics say innocence is not always presumed and that the authorities rely heavily on confessions.
Campaigners say suspects’ decisions to remain silent or deny charges often lead to lengthy, gruelling pre-trial detention, with confessions used as a de facto condition for release – hence the term “hostage justice”.
In June 2025, Runa – then a worker at a care facility for people with disabilities in western Japan’s Hyogo region – was arrested for allegedly assaulting one of them during a Valentine’s Day party.
Runa maintained innocence, with the complaint saying she was merely trying to stop the patient from biting another by gently pressing her hand against their chin.
It took the authorities 18 days to decide to drop charges against her altogether.
During her detention, she was denied access to her family, could only contact her lawyers and was repeatedly pressured to confess.
Runa is “one of the most tragic victims of hostage justice,” the complaint read, seeking 100 million yen (S$802,300) in redress.
During interrogations by police, she was threatened with the prospect of a reformatory and told she would not be able to see her mother if she does not confess, Masahiro Sasaki, a lawyer representing Runa’s mother, told AFP on June 18.
“You did it, didn’t you? Just tell the truth,” Sasaki quoted an investigator as telling Runa, citing a journal the girl kept while detained.
Runa as a result was diagnosed with acute stress, eating and post-traumatic stress disorders, the complaint said.
Sasaki questioned the validity of her arrest given the “extremely trifling” nature of her alleged assault, and her age that should have rendered detention justifiable “only when it’s absolutely necessary”.
There was also no probable cause to suspect the girl with no previous history of delinquency who lived under parenting supervision would flee or destroy evidence, he said.
Yet, prosecutors at least twice requested the extension of her detention while blocking her lawyer’s plea with a judge to end it.
It was not until a day after Runa vomited, collapsed and received brief medical care at an outside hospital that she was released on account of non-prosecution.
The Kobe District Public Prosecutors Office declined to comment to AFP, saying they had not yet received a complaint.
International rights bodies have repeatedly decried “hostage justice”.
One case in point is Iwao Hakamada, once the world’s longest-serving death-row inmate. His convictions, which were quashed in 2024, relied partly on confessions made during what the Supreme Court ruled were “inhumane” interrogations. AFP
