SHIZUOKA: The world’s longest-serving death row prisoner was acquitted on Thursday, more than half a century after his murder conviction, when a Japanese court ruled that evidence had been fabricated.

Ailing health prevented 88-year-old former boxer Iwao Hakamada from being in the court to learn the outcome of his retrial, which was granted a decade ago after a long campaign by supporters. But his 91-year-old sister Hideko, who often speaks for him, bowed deeply to the judge who declared Hakamada innocent.

“Everyone — we won the acquittal, it’s all thanks to your support,” she said outside the Shizuoka District Court, close to tears with her voice cracking.

Hakamada spent 46 years on death row after being convicted in 1968 of robbing and killing his boss, the man’s wife and their two teenage children. “Inv­e­stigators tampered with clothes by getting blood on them” which they then hid in a tank of miso, or fermented soybean paste, said Thursday’s ruling.

It slammed the use of “inhumane interrogations meant to force a statement... by imposing mental and physical pain”.

“The prosecution’s records were obtained by effectively infringing on the defendant’s right to remain silent, under circumstances extremely likely to elicit a false confession,” the ruling said.

Published in Dawn, September 27th, 2024