Death row inmate gets US$1.4mil payout

End of an ordeal: Hakamada (left) speaking beside his sister Hideko during a judgement report session in Shizuoka prefecture on Sept 29, 2024, two days after he was acquitted. — AFP

A Japanese man wrongly convicted of murder, who was the world’s longest-serving death row inmate, has been awarded US$1.4mil (RM6.2mil) in compensation, an official said.

The payout represents 12,500 yen (RM369) for each day of the more than four decades that Iwao Hakamada spent in detention, most of it on death row when each day could have been his last.