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.
