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Post by Admin on Dec 18, 2019 20:36:45 GMT
A Japanese court has ordered a high-profile TV reporter to pay 3.3 million yen ($30,000; £22,917) in damages to a journalist who accused him of rape. Shiori Ito alleged that Noriyuki Yamaguchi raped her in 2015 while she was unconscious.  Prosecutors said there was not enough evidence for a criminal case, so Ms Ito brought a civil case. Ms Ito has become a symbol of the #MeToo movement in a country where people rarely report sexual assault. "I'm so happy," said 30-year-old Ms Ito, who held up a sign which read "victory" after the verdict was announced. But in a news conference hours later, Mr Yamaguchi said he planned to appeal - and he again denied the rape allegations.  According to Ms Ito, 53-year-old Mr Yamaguchi - who is said to have close ties to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe - invited her to dinner to discuss a possible job opportunity in 2015. She suspects she may have been drugged, saying that when she regained consciousness, she was "in a hotel room and he was on top of me". Ms Ito was an intern at news agency Reuters when the alleged rape occurred. Mr Yamaguchi was then Washington bureau chief for the Tokyo Broadcasting System, a major media firm in Japan. Ms Ito filed a civil lawsuit against Mr Yamaguchi seeking 11 million yen ($100,517 ; £76,758) in compensation. Mr Yamaguchi, who denies any wrongdoing and claims the sex was consensual, filed a counter-suit seeking 130 million yen ($1,187,941; £907,135) in compensation. But this was rejected by the court. He will now have to pay Ms Ito $30,000 in damages, but there remains no criminal case against him. |
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Post by Admin on Dec 19, 2019 22:09:06 GMT
A court ordered a former Washington bureau chief of a television broadcaster on Wednesday to pay 3.3 million yen ($30,000) in damages for raping journalist Shiori Ito, seen as a symbol of the "#MeToo" movement in Japan, where few sexual assault victims come forward.
The Tokyo District Court recognized that Noriyuki Yamaguchi, 53, of Tokyo Broadcasting System Television Inc., known as TBS, "had sexual intercourse without the consent of Ito, who was in state of intoxication and unconscious."
Yamaguchi, who covered political affairs for the broadcaster, said in a press conference later that day he is unconvinced by the ruling that "ignored my claim," and will appeal it immediately. His lawyer Masaaki Kitaguchi said the court decision was "a great surprise."
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Post by Admin on Dec 20, 2019 3:54:51 GMT
In the trial, Ito, 30, sought 11 million yen in damages, saying she was raped at a hotel in 2015 while she was unconscious following a dinner in Tokyo with Yamaguchi, who had promised her assistance in getting a job. Yamaguchi has argued the act was consensual.
Ito "has no motive for making a false statement," Presiding Judge Akihiro Suzuki said in the ruling, while pointing out Yamaguchi's explanation had changed unreasonably on key points and raised serious doubts about its credibility.
The civil court's decision sharply contrasted with the criminal procedure, in which prosecutors had decided not to indict Yamaguchi due to insufficient evidence after Ito filed a complaint with police.
Ito unveiled her real name and published a book in October 2017 about her experience of the sexual assault and pointed to difficulties in raising the issue in society.
The ruling said Ito's action in making the incident public "was aimed at serving the public interest, as it was an act pursuing improvement in the situation surrounding sex crime victims."
After the ruling, Ito told reporters, "We have won." She also expressed appreciation as she held up a sign bearing the word "victory," and added, "Now I realize we have won by looking at this word."
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Post by Admin on Dec 20, 2019 18:25:27 GMT
In the afternoon press conference, Yamaguchi insisted that he did not commit a crime.
"I identified several discrepancies in Ito's assertion based on objective evidence but this was mostly ignored" by the court he said. "Only Ms. Ito's assertions were taken as the truth."
Flanked by his lawyer and two supporters, Yamaguchi said the court ruling may have been influenced by "one-sided" reports of domestic and foreign media including The New York Times and the BBC, which he claimed were in favor of Ito.
He said he has no intention of apologizing for a crime he did not commit, but said that it was "inappropriate" of him to have had sex with Ito, who was seeking advice on job opportunities.
Ito had filed a criminal complaint with the police after the incident, but prosecutors dropped the case in July 2016.
(Noriyuki Yamaguchi)
She later filed a complaint with the Committee for the Inquest of Prosecution, but it also judged in September 2017 that the prosecutors' decision was "appropriate," saying there was no reason to overturn it.
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Post by Admin on Dec 21, 2019 1:24:00 GMT
Shiori Ito, a prominent figure in the #MeToo movement in Japan, said Thursday her civil court victory in a rape case against a prominent political journalist was “one of the landmark cases for Japanese sex crimes” and that she was still “quite surprised” by the ruling.
Noriyuki Yamaguchi, a journalist said to be close to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, denied committing any crime at a separate news conference and repeated his intention to appeal Wednesday’s ruling at the Tokyo District Court.
Both the defendant and plaintiff held back-to-back news conferences at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan in Tokyo, with Yamaguchi, the former Washington bureau chief for Tokyo Broadcasting System Television Inc., speaking first. Ito gained entry to Yamaguchi’s news conference as a journalist.
The defendant also denied asking for an intervention in connection with the investigators’ decision to not continue to pursue the 2015 rape case, saying, “I didn’t ask any politician, police officer or bureaucrat to do anything about this case.”
The district court ordered Yamaguchi to pay ¥3.3 million in damages for raping Ito. It recognized he “had sexual intercourse without the consent of Ito, who was in a state of intoxication and unconscious.”
Initially Ito withheld her last name when speaking to media about the incident, but in 2017 she decided to disclose her full name and detailed the events in a book titled “Black Box,” pointing to the difficulty of raising the issue in society.
The book, which has been translated into Swedish, French, Chinese and Korean, was given the Best Journalism Award by the Free Press Association of Japan in 2018.
“In Japanese law … even when we speak about truth, you could be prosecuted so this (court recognition) was a very important decision for me as a journalist as well,” she said. Ito filed a criminal complaint with the police after the incident, but prosecutors dropped the case in July 2016, citing insufficient evidence.
Although she does not have concrete evidence, Ito said she believes Yamaguchi’s close ties with Abe, about whom he has written a best-seller, led prosecutors to drop the case, saying she was never given a reason for the decision.
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