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Tokyo: A Japanese man was sentenced to death by a regional court yesterday for killing a woman and her baby daughter when he was 18, a ruling that follows intense public debate in Japan over how severely young offenders should be punished.
The 1999 case in which the youth strangled and raped the woman and killed her 11-month-old baby prompted an outpouring of public emotion after the woman's husband appeared repeatedly in the media calling for the youth to be executed regardless of his age.
Convicted criminals can be executed by hanging in Japan if they are 18 or above at the time of the crime, but death penalties for young offenders are rare.
Name not divulged
In Japan, anyone under the age of 20 is deemed a minor and the defendant in this case cannot be named because the youth was 18 years and one month old when he committed the murders.
"This is not something to be happy about. I solemnly accept the court's decision," the widower, Hiroshi Motomura, told a news conference after the judge's verdict.
Japan enacted a law last year under which offenders as young as 11 can be sent to juvenile detention centres.
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