Kazuaki Shimazaki comments

Chappell's defense team has expressed concerns that if extradited, he might be made to confess under duress. Japan has argued that police interrogations in principle are recorded.

Japan needs to give diplomatic assurances that the principle would be applied to this specific case, not make a general statement of principle.

The problem here is what are ECHR standards, even, in concrete terms?

If you say it's the unconditional permission for attorneys to attend interrogations, then Germany doesn't have it for the police interrogation phase. You do indeed have to the defendant speak to a lawyer in some way, which Japan allows in principle.

The length of interrogation ... well, its said that it is now, on principle, 8 hours a day

What a concept ,bail. The Japanese authorities heads must be spinning.

As for this, previous ECHR case law has allowed for at least 60 days of pre-trial detention. And anyone even mentioning the name starting with G should remember his contribution in ensuring bail rights for foreigners who come after him.

I'm even more surprised that the JGov has let it adrift

I'm not sure they can help even if they want to. The budget for this fiscal year has already been allocated several months ago. Every yen (down to an error measured in mere hundreds of yen at most) has already been assigned to one department or another, for use in one month or another.

YubaruToday 05:16 pm JST

Well, then it's time to stop all outside activities right? Construction workers are in the sun just as long, if not longer than these baseball players. Oh and what about the old guys who are directing traffic at these sites too!

Construction workers aren't competing. While it is still bad, to some extent they can cope by moving more slowly or procrastinating more when the heat gets bad. His work chief is likely to be a veteran who understands what it is all about. He's not expected to make a maximum exertion in the blazing sun. The societal costs of unfinished buildings also exceeds that of competitive sports.

Well, let's get it over with. The faster that water is released, the faster the less rational part of the world can start getting over it.

@toraToday  02:47 pm JST

The idea of these scams is to speed-rush the victim, making him believe he needs to hand over the money. Now. Not two days later. The same panic that makes him rush to the ATM in the first place will cause him to override or disable any time-based protections. Further, there's always a small but finite chance that it is for real (this possibility is why these schemes work at all), and no bank will want to be the one who caused severe consequences by being the party to hold up a truly time critical transaction.

If we can ban kids from doing things because we don't think they have the mental capacity, in principle there can be little objection to banning older people on the same pretext. Further

On July 26, it came to light that the National Police Agency has proposed locking ATM use for any bank account held by someone over 65 years of age that hasn’t had a transaction in over one year.

It targets a limited group. By using the ATM at least once a year, you can keep your ability to continue using it. One has to admit the sudden use of an ATM by someone who hasn't used it for years is highly unusual and can justify special scrutiny.

Then one day they will actually get to a hearing in which some quack oh sorry " child psychologist or child welfare expert" will claim that so much times has past, the child doesn't remember much of the other country or the language and that the child is fully settled with family, grandparents, school and interrupting this at that point would cause trauma and mental damage.

Hold it, how do you justify calling the expert witness a quack? Have you personally examined any of the involved children that gives you grounds to refute the expert? Or are you actually saying he can be right and he should be ignored because...

@girl_in_tokyoToday 07:58 am JST

And they would be wrong. That's why you shouldn't assume anything. I am not sure why, but heterosexuals, particularly males, just assume they are the default and that normalcy revolves around their preferences. It's a very arrogant and self-important attitude.

Try not to read anything and everything as a sign of potential mysogyny.

I wrote it out that way because as far as I know you are a woman.

If I believed you were a male, the sentence would have gone "everyone will see that you are a MAN and conclude if you date with or approach anyone it'd be a WOMAN."

For the other part of your response, assumptions are an inevitable part of life, simply because we don't have time to ascertain everything, ascertaining everything can be anywhere from inconvenient to personally dangerous, and also because the average human mind feels anxiety when they are aware potentially important variables have to be left as "UNKNOWN" or Blank. Interpolations and Extrapolations from limited data are a part of the human existence and contribute to mental stability.

@Strangerland July 27 12:59 pm JST

Again, how is this different from racism? What percentage of individuals is it ok to discriminate against, before it goes from making a judgement based on a one-sided statistic, to bigotry/racism?

Ah, I see, the slippery slope fallacy. What I'd say is that honestly, the line is situational, but over 80% would certainly be a safe place when that line is far enough away it is functionally out of sight.

I say the line is situational because it clearly depends on the disadvantage placed on each side. For example, over on the other thread there's a spat over banning students from a certain school (collective) based on the actions of a percentage of them. Since the disadvantage to the students (not being able to use one restaurant) is limited compared to the potential damage to the restaurant from rowdy students, it's hard to blame the restaurant for its defensive measures if even 10% of the visiting students are disruptive. For something with a greater disadvantage, the burden of proof gets higher. But if the the probability is over 50%, I really find it hard to blame taking a shortcut unless the disadvantage to one side would simply be massive (for example, no one will say 50% is good enough for a criminal conviction), which clearly is not the case here.

StrangerlandToday 12:31 pm JST

What if their conclusion is wrong, and she has no interest in men whatsoever?

Given the actual ratio between heterosexuals and LGBTs, the probability of hit is something like 95%, which is rather good for a heuristic. Plus it's guaranteed to hit all the heterosexuals in the room, and I don't see how a 5% chance of being wrong negates this.

girl_in_tokyoJuly 26 06:39 am JST

Sorry, but what do you mean by this? There is no good argument for outing someone. None.

I am saying that heterosexuals are outed from the start simply because they are the majority and default. You are a woman. If you walk into a room, everyone will see that you are a woman and conclude if you date with or approach anyone it'd be a man. Trying to block this automatic heuristic is like fighting the sea. In that sense, you are outed from the start. From that perspective, letting everyone know homosexual man will be approaching or trying to date males is only evening out the playing field.

Nihon Enigma Today 08:58 am JST does have a good point. Ultimately, this is no different from for example banning non-Japanese in onsen or not renting apartments to them on grounds they have an increased estimated probability of causing problems.

So you can choose between one or another position, either to respect the seller/lessor's right to free contracting (sales are also contracts) and to protect the sanctity of their spaces or to insist that everyone be given the benefit of the doubt and treated as individuals rather than a stereotyped collective.

But you shouldn't have different answers for each scenario.

girl_in_tokyoToday 02:01 pm JST

No. The best way to end discrimination is for people not to be bigots. It's not hard to not be a bigot. It's only hard when people make the active decision to be a terrible human being and foist their horrible behavior onto others.

You do realize that could be an argument for outing him. One cannot decide whether or not to be a bigot if they don't even know about someone's membership in whatever-minority-demographic.

Like feminism, this case represents the schizophrenic attitudes of gay advocates, where they kind of want to be equals and be protected (thus not equals) at the same time. From an "equal" perspective, heterosexuals are outed by default, and following this any homosexual who demands his preference to be treated as an equal should be ready to do the same. But that's not what happens.

I'd be surprised if a real kid good enough to write a program in C didn't pick up enough general computer knowledge along the way such that he can't figure out Powerpoint, even if he hasn't been specifically taught on how to use it.

That's not my experience of employees who studied technical subjects at college or university. But I hope you're not suggesting a "knowledge of computers" involves understanding of PowerPoint and Google.

I'd say it's a problem if they don't either specifically know how to use PowerPoint and Google or have developed a generalized skill and knowledge base that's deep enough to allow them to quickly pick up on the basics of using either when it is needed.

Kids here get the worst swimming lessons I’ve seen out of any developed nation.

School Swimming lessons in Japan may compare poorly to Australia (don't have personal experience with either), but I go to an international school in Hong Kong (Canadian system) and I definitely had ZERO education in swimming. The local school system AFAIK doesn't have swimming lessons (swimming clubs are another matter) either, so if any is provided it's already a one up.

Tony W.Today 09:13 am JST

The headmaster "requested" students not to go to the river? He should have BANNED them from going! The more emphatic statement might have made a difference.

What was he supposed to do? Even if he can catch them, should he apply the school disciplinary system against kids that are not on school premises or under the direct supervision of a teacher, not on school hours, in summer vacation no less. I thought usually the Japanese school system is already considered too interventionist on what students can do after school hours.

Through her actions, this woman has caused her child to become a diabetic, which is going to have a knock-on effect and create all sorts of other health problems that have a high probability of shortening her life expectancy ....

Well, if that is true, the fact she caused easily identifiable permanent damage can be used to justify a higher sentence, but the article doesn't say that. It said the kid was discovered with hypoglycemia, a.k.a low blood sugar. Left untreated, diabetics lack sufficient insulin to break down sugar and get hyperglycemia, high blood sugar. Hypoglycemia happens to diabetics when they mismanage their insulin intake relative to the food they eat and the insulin "dissolves" too much of the sugar in the bloodstream.

The reason for they hypoglycemia probably had little to do with pancreatic function and everything to do with the fact that deprived of food, all the sugar in the bloodstream had been converted.

The poor child is still very much alive thank goodness, which you would be aware of if you had read and understood the article.

It's hard to say what's right for this case. Obviously, the kid did not die, which eliminates homicide. It's also clear that the holder of parental right did not intend kid to die, even if it may only be because she wants those payouts. That eliminates attempted homicide. Basically, under the law, it is impossible to justify a really heavy sentence for her, and an attempt to force the issue would be to harm the rule of law. Thus, I should hope that this community doesn't get up to its usual hijinks when this case is reported again and the woman given a light sentence.

Having said that, there is an unsatisfied desire for something more.

According to police, the man, Masaki Nakamura, said that he “doesn’t understand” the allegations against him, Kyodo News reported. 

All right Masaki, I'd believe you, if you agree to limiting your dispositive civil capacity and henceforth have a curator approve all your civil law activities (for those not familiar with the law, this includes regular activities like buying groceries). There's no way you are fit for independent disposition if you can't understand this allegation.

There are less than 10,000 transexuals in Japan out of a population of 127 million. The transexual laws make it very difficult to change. Hate is stirred up by social network rumors and gossip.

This "less than" argument can be interpreted to mean said transsexuals should understand the majority should not be forced to change their ways or endanger themselves to accomodate their itty-bitty minority group, and if they are forced to do so by some gaiatsu or some judges drunk on the latest Western fad the resentment might make it even worse for them than if they accept they can't use the female toilet.

https://www.hrw.org/report/2019/03/20/really-high-hurdle/japans-abusive-transgender-legal-recognition-process

HRW will NOT hold itself responsible for the side effects or unintended consequences of mollycoddling this little minority ... I won't call them sick, but they are enough on the edge to be wierd. Human rights groups have their place, but they are often comprised of idiots who don't want to understand there are such things as tradeoffs. They imagine a world where defendants can have every right in the sky without the police losing any effectiveness. They imagine all these trans-sexuals being allowed to go to whichever side they please, again without consequences. The rest of the world, especially the government, is more realistic.

Only real solution is a third bathroom category.

Which unfortunately the transgender population is few enough to make it hard to justify except in very large places.

@mikeylikesitJuly 17 01:30 pm JST

Unfortunately, what you say is true. As our studies into children improve, the margins for good child bearing has gotten tighter to meet. It's getting to the point that we are finding out about how whether a mother is around to constantly talk to her newborn baby can actually affect his intelligence, not just whether he had a happy infanthood. This pushes the argument towards a full time attendant (stay-at home mother) for each kid rather than the mother working and throwing the kid into a collective care center whether the carer-cared for ratio must be much less than 1:1.

餓死鬼Today 06:51 am JST

What did the guy think would happen? The boy would be fine and all potty trained after a 75 C shower?

Let's think of the points in his favor. Though he would have to be on the ignorant side of things for this to be true, but the temperature is less than 100 degrees, and it is not impossible for someone to be unaware that burns are possible at a mere 70-80 degrees - thinking it is merely "hot" rather than "scalding". The fact that skin damage that covers over half the body are more than what it can compensate for may also be news to him.

Larr FlintToday 08:20 am JST

10 years for boiling a 3yo kiddo in the bathtub is a joke.

He wasn't "boiled" - boiling is to raise the water temperature to 100 degrees, so it begins evaporating at a high speed. That's one reason he wasn't convicted of murder. The penalty he received is well within what is customary for Continental Law systems, though less than what a Common Law man is accustomed to.

SpeedToday 08:56 am JST

I'm actually surprised he didn't get the weak seven year sentence one usually gets in Japan for killing your own children. Should've gotten fifty to life.

There's no such thing as a "50-year" sentence in Japan. Once you are above 15 years or so, the jump is to "life".

@opheliajadefeldtToday 11:03 am JST

No one here knows his real intentions, he says it was not intentional.

Which means the onus is on the prosecutor to prove that intention beyond reasonable doubt.

I will only add that, had he held his hand in the shower water before placing his son there, he would have been well aware that the water was too hot.

It goes beyond that. He clearly intends to punish the child, so inflicting pain is purposive (a.k.a. direct intent). He probably also had indirect intent on inflicting a degree of injury. However, neither of these link to the thought that the water is hot enough to be fatal. If you beat someone with a stick, you directly intend to inflict pain and are indifferent to injury, but that doesn't mean you want or don't care for his life.

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I end with a quote from Bohlander's Principles of German Criminal Law (German law forms the basis of much of Japanese law, especially criminal):

Another frequent scenario are those cases where D is about to be stopped at a police road checkpoint and, because he is either subject to an arrest warrant or has something else to hide, drives straight at the police man standing in the road; the latter can barely save himself by jumping into the roadside ditch. Moral indignation at such behaviour would make it easy to infer that D would have driven over P had he not managed to get out of the way, if necessary accepting a lethal result. However, the courts have gone the other way and argued that offenders in these situations rather bank on the reaction of the police men: they accept endangering them, but do not actually contemplate that they will be killed. Coupled with the generally accepted high psychological threshold for intentional homicide offences, the BGH has consistently tended to reject trial courts’ findings that D acted with conditional intent with respect to P’s death.

Though not entirely the same scenario, the point I want to make is that Continental Law courts tend to have high standards for proving intent for homicide.

So there are "international standards" on polluting the ocean. That's ridiculous.

Yes there are. Unless we are to ban any output of nuclear reactor remnants into the sea, which has not been the standard even under normal operation, there will be an "acceptable level" on polluting the ocean, especially when that level is less than the normal background variation between localities.

Which is only correct, and it is clear Wishma's relatives can assemble the money for a plane ticket if they tried, given the current proceedings.

MoonrakerJuly 12 06:01 pm JST

Cos death is such an expected and logical outcome of visa overstay, isn't it? Must be obvious to all, right?

It is a logical and expected outcome if you choose to play chicken with your own body in an attempt to force the authorities to give you an undeserved right to stay where she doesn't belong. There's nothing I've seen that suggests Wishma would have died if, for example, she just agreed to go back - which she actually was willing to do until a crappy NGO fed her ideas. And of course she wouldn't have died if she had only followed the law.

@JohnJuly 9 10:54 pm JST

I thought there is an international rule that someone cannot be taken to trial more than once about the same crime.

The requirement is this:

ICCPR Article 14

No one shall be liable to be tried or punished again for an offence for which he has already been finally convicted or acquitted in accordance with the law and penal procedure of each country.

The word "finally" is there to accomodate Continental Legal systems, which allows the prosecutor, not only the defense, to appeal. In this case, he has not been "finally acquitted", just granted a retrial (beyond the regular procedure which he has already passed and found guilty).

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@Dave FairToday 07:55 am JST

Seems the conclusion by the Tokyo High Court that evidence had been planted by investigators is just too much for prosecutors to bear, the greatest insult and must not be allowed to stand. Pride at the expense of justice and decency, what a shame Ministry of Justice!

Aren't we supposed to be presuming innocence? Then we must at least grant the possibility the prosecutorial service is innocent of this insinulation by the High Court, and accordingly they be allowed to argue that version. The Court might have said there is a not insignificant possibility (say 5% to give it a number), sufficient to reintroduce reasonable doubt, no more than that but as evidenced by you that's would not be how the audience, especially Japan-bashing Westerners will read it. This reasonable doubt will be translated into "Yeah they did it". So in a sense how people interpret this kind of ruling is in itself a reason they have to fight it if they think they can.

Multiple charges with multiple arrests, it can be used against real criminal and also to any innocent person in Japan.

He did shoot three people - that's why they can reorganize it how they want.

If you can’t afford kids, don’t have them. As a responsible person who cannot afford kids, why should my taxes go to support your child rearing that you “cannot afford”.

It depends. Do you want Japan as a country to go on? If you are Japanese, you probably would, and that might mean you have an interest in supporting those who are at least willing to have kids but just can't land a sufficiently paying job.

"I'm extremely worried as I don't know to what extent the release of the treated water will affect my work and livelihood," said Eitatsu Kikuchi, a fisherman preparing his boat in Soma, Fukushima Prefecture.

Yes, of course you don't. But you have to remember you were all sitting there, lapping up that electricity back when that plant was running. To the extent that not everything possible was done, a portion of the monetary savings ended up in your electrical bill which is not as expensive as it might have been otherwise, and to be honest if they had proposed a safety renovation while telling how much of a bulge it'd make in your electrical bill you might well have refused yourself. Sometimes the dice doesn't roll your way, and everyone has to take some of the hit.

How times have changed. I remember calculators being banned in exams in my day, as you had to work everything out on your own. Now it is AI being banned. The forward movement of science and the reduction on what you need to actually work out for yourself in exams is constantly on the move. Next it may be chip implants in the brain will need to be turned off in exams, once they become common place.

The justification is that they are reducing the emphasis on mechanical computation to allow more room for higher abstract skills.