The gunman charged with killing Japan’s former prime minister Shinzo Abe was found guilty and jailed for life, as the judge declared the broad- daylight assassination “despicable and extremely malicious”.
The shooting over three years ago forced a reckoning in a country with little experience of gun violence and ignited scrutiny of ties between prominent conservative lawmakers and a secretive sect, the Unification Church.
As he handed down the sentence at a court in the city of Nara, judge Shinichi Tanaka said Tetsuya Yamagami, 45, had been “determined” to shoot Abe.
The fact he “shot him from behind and did so when (Abe) was least expecting it” points to the “despicable and extremely malicious” nature of his act, he said.
A queue of people waited yesterday morning for tickets to enter the courtroom, highlighting intense public interest in the trial.
Yamagami looked down and expressed little emotion during the sentencing for charges including murder and firearms control law violations, after he used a handmade gun to kill Japan’s longest-serving leader during his campaign speech in July 2022.
The defence team of Yamagami – who had admitted to murder at the trial opening in October – told a press conference they had not yet decided whether to appeal, which under Japan’s legal system must be done within two weeks.
Prosecutors had argued that the defendant’s motive to kill Abe was rooted in his desire to besmirch the Unification Church, to which his mother’s blind donations plunged his family into bankruptcy. — AFP
