A Tokyo businessman was sentenced to life in prison yesterday for a wave of brutal assaults on women, but was cleared over the abduction and killing of British bar hostess Lucie Blackman.
Joji Obara, a wealthy former property developer, was convicted of raping nine women. One of them, Australian Carita Ridgway -- a 21-year-old bar hostess like Blackman -- died.
Blackman's mother Jane Steare said after the verdict her "worst fears have come true."
Obara, 54, had been on trial since 2000 on charges that he preyed on young women working in the nightlife industry of the famously safe Japanese capital.
"It is natural for the victims to seek severe punishment. These were extremely selfish acts based on his abnormal sexual habits," Judge Tsutomu Tochigi said.
"The accused treated the victims as sex objects," he said.
But the Tokyo District Court acquitted Obara of all charges related to Blackman's death.
"There is nothing to prove that he was involved in the rape and her death. The court cannot prove he was single-handedly involved in her death," the judge said. "What is clear is that the victim acted together with the accused and then vanished and, following that, she was found dead."
Wearing a black jacket and glasses, his hair greying and thinning, Obara looked ahead attentively and occasionally nodded as the verdict was read.
Obara, who denied all the charges, was found guilty of attacks on five Japanese women as well as four foreigners -- an Australian, a Briton, a Canadian and a Ukrainian.
Blackman's father Tim watched silently in court, with an interpreter writing down messages on a paper.
Lucie Blackman vanished while she was working in bars in the seedy Roppongi district to save money for a holiday in Australia. Her dismembered body was found seven months later in a seaside cave on Tokyo's outskirts.
The case triggered a storm of media coverage in Britain and even a personal appeal by Prime Minister Tony Blair.
"I'm heartbroken, just heartbroken. I just can't believe this verdict," Steare said from England.
She did not fly to Japan because she could not face seeing Obara across a court room.
She faulted her ex-husband for accepting condolence money from one of Obara's friends, alleging [the money] influenced the decision.
Victim Carita Ridgway's mother voiced relief that the payout did not affect Obara's conviction over her daughter's death.
"Carita's family feel a deep sense of anger, betrayal and disappointment in relation to the 1992 police investigation into Carita's death," mother Annette Foster told reporters in Tokyo.
The judge said that Obara drugged Ridgway with chloroform, a colorless drug used as an anaesthetic in the 19th century. She died of hepatitis at a Tokyo hospital in February 1992.
Obara was not charged with murder, which would have made him eligible for the death penalty.
His lawyer, Yasuo Shionoya, said they were filing an appeal and that Obara feels "very sorry" over Blackman.
"He understands that Lucie was found in a sad situation, but please read the court's decision -- this was not Mr Obara's crime," he said.
Nvidia Corp yesterday unveiled its new high-speed interconnect technology, NVLink Fusion, with Taiwanese application-specific IC (ASIC) designers Alchip Technologies Ltd (世芯) and MediaTek Inc (聯發科) among the first to adopt the technology to help build semi-custom artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure for hyperscalers. Nvidia has opened its technology to outside users, as hyperscalers and cloud service providers are building their own cost-effective AI chips, or accelerators, used in AI servers by leveraging ASIC firms’ designing capabilities to reduce their dependence on Nvidia. Previously, NVLink technology was only available for Nvidia’s own AI platform. “NVLink Fusion opens Nvidia’s AI platform and rich ecosystem for
WARNING: From Jan. 1 last year to the end of last month, 89 Taiwanese have gone missing or been detained in China, the MAC said, urging people to carefully consider travel to China Lax enforcement had made virtually moot regulations banning civil servants from making unauthorized visits to China, the Control Yuan said yesterday. Several agencies allowed personnel to travel to China after they submitted explanations for the trip written using artificial intelligence or provided no reason at all, the Control Yuan said in a statement, following an investigation headed by Control Yuan member Lin Wen-cheng (林文程). The probe identified 318 civil servants who traveled to China without permission in the past 10 years, but the true number could be close to 1,000, the Control Yuan said. The public employees investigated were not engaged in national
ALL TOGETHER: Only by including Taiwan can the WHA fully exemplify its commitment to ‘One World for Health,’ the representative offices of eight nations in Taiwan said The representative offices in Taiwan of eight nations yesterday issued a joint statement reiterating their support for Taiwan’s meaningful engagement with the WHO and for Taipei’s participation as an observer at the World Health Assembly (WHA). The joint statement came as Taiwan has not received an invitation to this year’s WHA, which started yesterday and runs until Tuesday next week. This year’s meeting of the decisionmaking body of the WHO in Geneva, Switzerland, would be the ninth consecutive year Taiwan has been excluded. The eight offices, which reaffirmed their support for Taiwan, are the British Office Taipei, the Australian Office Taipei, the
DANGEROUS DRIVERS: The proposal follows a fatal incident on Monday involving a 78-year-old driver, which killed three people and injured 12 The Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday said it would lower the age for elderly drivers to renew their license from 75 to 70 as part of efforts to address safety issues caused by senior motorists. The new policy was proposed in light of a deadly incident on Monday in New Taipei City’s Sansia District (三峽), in which a 78-year-old motorist surnamed Yu (余) sped through a school zone, killing three people and injuring 12. Last night, another driver sped down a street in Tainan’s Yuching District (玉井), killing one pedestrian and injuring two. The incidents have sparked public discussion over whether seniors
RSS