Comment by DeOrio

November 13, 2007 @ 11:50 am

The following is a comment I left concerning item 4 - “LA TIMES: HOW J POLICE IGNORE CERTAIN CRIMES. LIKE MURDER” on Debito.org. I thought I’d repeat it here for the sake of discussion and/or clarification.

Good article, pointing the serious problem of the serious dearth of investigation involved in almost any crime in Japan and the lack of investigative know-how and training.

I fear one example was overstated, though:

Or take the suicide in April of Agriculture Minister Toshikatsu Matsuoka, who was found hanged in his Tokyo apartment. Matsuoka was embroiled in a scandal involving the misappropriation of political funds that suggested a broad system of organized influence peddling. Even though Matsuoka’s troubles were destabilizing the government, and his death occurred just hours before his scheduled appearance to answer questions before a parliamentary committee, no autopsy was conducted to ensure that he had not died from something other than hanging.

While foul play could have been involved, Matsuoka left at least six different suicide notes and was found alive. He was rushed to Keio Hospital and died there not long after. Given that his scandals had been in the public eye for months, his resignation rejected (privately) once by PM Abe, and that the damning bits were already quite public, it would seem highly unlikely that he was killed to cover something up. His testimony would have been largely a rehashing of the embarrassing public questions and defenses he’d gone through earlier. Besides, there was no indication that he was chomping at the bit to divulge any dirty secrets anyway. Even if he had been, the kantei had access to much better options than killing him to keep his scandals and testimony from hurting them.

On top of that, Matsuoka was but one of at least four very high-ranking members of the government to have been involved in such scandals (five if you count abuse of public funds in addition to misrepresentations on political fund reports) - two resigned, Matsuoka committed suicide, Ibuki is now Secretary General of the LDP. What good would killing Matsuoka have done, unless a spree was in order or the kantei’s political opponents and the public were going to just forget about everything? Matsuoka’s death raised the profile of the scandals, it certainly did nothing to mollify those angered by malfeasance on the part of pols.

Matsuoka’s death was one unlikely to have provoked an autopsy in pretty much any country but for the fact that he was a powerful public figure. Including it in a list with cases in which there really does appear to be police incompetence kind of undercuts the argument being made and looks a bit as though there’s an overreaching attempt being made to include the high reaches of power in the article without going on too long or getting into confusing issues.

Comment by Ken Y-N

November 13, 2007 @ 3:59 pm

DeOrio, after reading that article, I am waiting for people to start claiming Japan’s murder rate is 10 times higher than the reported number. Actually, I wonder if the LA Times deliberately didn’t report what the experts thought the real rate of murder might be.

Comment by DeOrio

November 13, 2007 @ 4:48 pm

I fear you won’t have to wait long to see claims of a much higher-than-reported murder rate. I think the LA Times‘ case was certainly made more easily by leaving out official stats. While I would agree that there is a distinct lack of professionalism on the part of Japan’s law enforcement agencies, from top to bottom, I fear the tendency of the argument to be presented in black in white terms, viz. that police incompetence equals police malfeasance or even malice or that distinct failures in one area can be applied to all matters concerning the police.

This is very similar to what we see in issues of discrimination. While there is certainly racism and attendant racial profiling based on stereotypes in Japan and there is certainly a worrying degree of rooted, institutionalized racism, we are at a point when many foreigners view every reproval, every sideways glance, or every refusal as being motivated by racism or xenophobia, which is not the case.

Taking this back to the police, I find it, sadly, very easy to believe that some police officers would fudge an investigation or cover up evidence of a crime they can’t solve, just as they cover up exculpatory evidence in some criminal cases, but I think we’re looking at a few deplorable extreme instances when we talk about murder, not a routine practice in terms of calling murder something else.

This speaks to the fundamental nature of policing, though. If it is done to maintain order and keep crime rates low, to keep the people feeling safe, then the practices employed in Japan are quite effective. After all, the best tool the Japanese police have in their kit is the perception that crime rates are low. Crime rates often work on positive feedback cycles - increases in the crime rate may well make would-be criminals feel less aversion to committing crimes.

Let’s face it, even if the murder rate were ten times what it is reported to be (and, yes, I agree 100% that it is fishy that the official estimate was not included in the article), most people would care only if they felt themselves to be in danger.

Comment by Arudou Debito

November 13, 2007 @ 7:50 pm

Hi TPR. Let’s also look at the political dimension. Somebody up there doesn’t like that this information has come out. I just put this up on my blog today–text aside from CAPS from someone else. Debito

Posted Nov 13, 10:27 AM on Debito.org at
http://www.debito.org/index.php/?p=713

FEEDBACK FROM CYBERSPACE. YOU KNOW YOU’VE TOUCHED A NERVE WITH THE POWERS THAT BE IN JAPAN WHEN THE NEWS CARRIES NEWS ABOUT NEWS OVERSEAS. EXPECT FURTHER ATTEMPTS TO STIR UP A DOMESTIC BACKLASH AND ACCUSATIONS THE THE REPORTER IS A JAPAN BASHER… I’VE SEEN THIS REACTION BEFORE REGARDING OVERSEAS REPORTAGE ON THE OTARU ONSENS CASE (BOOK JAPANESE ONLY PP 88-93). DEBITO IN SAPPORO

L.A. Times criticizes Japan over sumo wrestler’s death
Tatsuhito Iida / Yomiuri Shimbun Correspondent
Nov. 11, 2007
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/world/20071111TDY03103.htm
Courtesy of Gavin.

LOS ANGELES–Friday’s issue of the Los Angeles Times carried a story harshly criticizing Japanese police over the recent case of a 17-year-old sumo wrestler who died after being beaten by his stablemaster and his stablemates, claiming that police are too reluctant to conduct judicial autopsies.

The article said: “Photos of the dead teenager’s corpse show a deep cut on his right arm, horrific bruising…and his legs are pocked with small burns the size of a lit cigarette…The cause of death was ‘heart disease,’ police declared.”

Referring to the decision by Aichi prefectural police not to conduct an autopsy and instead conclude that the wrestler, Takashi Saito, of the Tokitsukaze stable, had died of a health condition, the front-page article said Japanese police “try to avoid adding murders to their case load unless the identity of the killer is obvious.”

As reasons for the low rate of implementing autopsies, the article quoted Japanese sources as saying, “Police discourage autopsies that might reveal a higher murder rate in their jurisdiction and pressure doctors to attribute unnatural deaths to health reasons, usually heart failure,” and, “There is also a cultural resistance in Japan to handling the dead, with families often reluctant to insist upon a procedure that invades the body of a loved one.”

The article concluded that though Japan’s autopsy system was introduced by the United States just after the end of World War II, it is not functioning sufficiently.
(Nov. 11, 2007)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
米紙ＬＡタイムズ、力士急死問題で日本の検視を批判

11月10日12時3分配信 読売新聞

　【ロサンゼルス＝飯田達人】９日付の米ロサンゼルス・タイムズ紙は、大相撲の時津風部屋の序ノ口力士、斉藤俊さん（当時１７歳）の急死を巡り、愛知県警が当初、司法解剖をせず、病死とした問題を取り上げ、「日本の警察は悪を直視していない」と日本の検視制度を厳しく批判する記事を１面などに載せた。

　記事は、「斉藤さんの遺体に多数の傷があり、足にはたばこの火の焼け跡まであったのに、愛知県警はなぜか心疾患と判断した」と指摘。さらに、同県警が昨年扱った変死体のうち、検視官による検視が行われたのは６・３％で、全国でも１１・２％に過ぎないとした。

　検視率が低い理由として、同紙は、〈１〉日本の警察は管轄内の殺人などの比率が上がるのを嫌がり、病死や自殺として処理しようとする傾向がある〈２〉被害者の遺族も体が切り刻まれるのを嫌がる——などと指摘。「日本の検視制度は第２次大戦後に米国が導入したが、十分に機能していない」と総括している。

最終更新:11月10日12時3分

http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20071110-00000503-yom-soci

Also: http://news.goo.ne.jp/article/yomiuri/nation/20071110i503-yol.html (with link to the LA Times article 1/3 the way down the page)

END

Comment by Ken Worsley

November 14, 2007 @ 1:21 am

Can anyone imagine the family having allowed (or been able to allow) an autopsy?

Comment by DeOrio

November 14, 2007 @ 10:33 am

I can imagine the family fearing retribution if they pushed the issue.

Comment by Ken Worsley

November 14, 2007 @ 5:01 pm

Yeah, DeOrio, that’s what I’m thinking. Explicit threats would not even have to be made. A nice ‘insurance’ payout and a few stern looks should be all it needs.