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Youth murder shocks
Japan
By Suvendrini Kakuchi
TOKYO - Shock and soul-searching gripped Japan
as police began investigations into the case of a
12-year-old boy who admitted last week that he had
murdered a kindergarten student on July 1.
The
middle-school boy, who was spotted by a security camera,
told the police last Thursday that he took Shun
Tanemoto, the four-year-old victim, to play a prank on
him by stripping him naked. Police quoted the boy as
saying. "I want to say sorry to Shun's father and
mother."
Police suspect the student murdered the
boy because he was afraid of attracting attention after
Shun resisted being stripped naked.
Shun went
missing after he told his parents he was going to play
at a video-game center in a shopping complex in
Nagasaki, 980 kilometers south of Tokyo. The next day,
police discovered his naked and bloody body after, they
say, he was pushed off the roof of a nearby parking
garage.
The murder is the latest in several
horrifying crimes committed by youth recently in Japan
and revives questions that many in this country find
themselves asking after hearing of such news.
"Whatever has happened to the peaceful and
harmonious Japan we knew?" asked a 53-year-old
businessman interviewed on television.
Many
consider this case particularly disturbing because the
suspect is very young and was a "quiet, good" child.
The principal of his school said he never missed
a day of class and had excellent grades. Neighbors
interviewed by the media described the student's
three-member family as close.
The case also
brings back memories of a 1997 crime in Kobe, where a
14-year-old boy was convicted for two murders and a
string of attacks on young children in the city.
The boy beheaded his 11-year-old victim and left
the head on the wall of his school. He did not give a
motive, but sent taunting messages to his victim's
parents.
The crime was so compelling that Japan
revised its 1949 juvenile code to allow children as
young as 14, who have committed serious delinquency, to
be held criminally responsible for their acts.
The boy who killed the four-year-old child this
month, however, will be held under the Child Welfare
Law, and was sent to the family court.
Predictably, this latest high-profile crime by a
young person has stoked calls for tougher ways of
dealing with such violence.
Shun's parents
released a statement in which they said "their hearts
are boiling with rage" and said the student should get
no less than capital punishment. "We would like to say
this to the perpetrator: Are you really repentant? We
sincerely hope that you will pay for your deeds for the
rest of your life," said the statement read out by a
police official.
But lawyers working on
children's rights say a kneejerk reaction at this point
helps no one - including the youth.
"I am very
worried that the intense public reaction will encourage
moves to further lower the age of young perpetrators to
be sent to prison, instead of those that focus in
reforming people," said lawyer Hiromi Sugiura, who works
with victims of serious and violent
crime.
Sending more young people to prison will
not stop crime, she explained. "What is needed is a
long-term view and recognition of social problems that
are also responsible for the problems," Sugiura added.
Under the current law, family courts are in
principle required to send all juvenile murder suspects
aged 16 and over to public prosecutors.
For
crimes such as murder and rape, prosecutors are allowed
to participate in family court proceedings, including
having access to court records, attending hearings and
questioning suspects during the proceedings.
In
June last year, three teenagers were sentenced to life
in prison under the revised law. They were convicted for
stealing 5,000 yen (US$42) and beating to death a young
passer-by.
Akira Ishii, professor of criminal
psychiatry at Aoyama Gaukin University, says that amid
the rising rates in juvenile crime, toughening existing
laws would hurt Japanese children badly.
"The
breakdown of community and family traditions in modern
Japan has seen [a rise in] crime without clear motives,"
he said. "More money should be spent on providing mental
support for our youth and analyzing social conditions to
understand them better."
In early July, two boys
aged 14 and 16 were arrested in Okinawa prefecture on
suspicion of killing a schoolmate and abandoning his
body. They said the victim stole a purse and had to be
punished.
In December, prosecutors indicted two
boys, 15 and 16, in Fukushima prefecture, western Japan,
for rape and robbery charges. The boys withdrew money
from their 34-year-old victim's bank, and raped and held
her captive for one night.
The number of arrests
of youths aged 19 and under during the first six months
of 2002 totaled 65,573, up 6.8 percent from the same
period the previous year. Serious crimes, however, made
up less than 0.6 percent of these, according to police
figures.
(Inter Press Service)
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