TOKYO - The mother of a 5-year-old girl admitted to parental neglect resulting in the child's death last year in the first court hearing Tuesday of a high-profile abuse case that has prompted Japan to revise laws to better protect children.
Yuri Funato, 27, is suspected of causing her daughter's death from sepsis in March 2018 in Tokyo's Meguro Ward after not feeding her adequately since around late January the same year, resulting in the child developing pneumonia.
She also failed to take her daughter to hospital in late February last year, when the child's condition seriously weakened from being physically abused by her father Yudai Funato, 34, according to the indictment.
Prosecutors said the girl was only given one or two cups of soup a day and was repeatedly assaulted, including being doused with cold water.
"I didn't know my husband had beaten Yua," a weeping Funato told the Tokyo District Court, adding she was "too afraid of reprisals" from Yudai to report anything to the authorities.
The defense team said Funato is responsible for her failure to stop her husband's abuse but said it was difficult for her to stand up to him as she was subjected to his persistent psychological abuse herself and was under his strong control.
During the court session, Presiding Judge Minoru Morishita stopped prosecutors from reading out charges against Funato to make sure she was okay, saying she appeared to be hyperventilating.
Yudai, who was arrested on suspicion of assault against Yua and negligence resulting in her death, is scheduled to face trial on Oct. 1.
The girl weighed about 12 kilograms when she died, far less than the 20-kg average of children of her age. She left notes in which she made desperate pleas for parents to "forgive" her and stop mistreating her.
Yua's death on March 2, 2018, attracted nationwide attention and prompted Japan to enact revised laws in June, banning parents and other guardians from physically punishing children and strengthening the ability of child welfare centers to intervene in abuse cases.
The child had been living in Kagawa Prefecture in western Japan before moving to Tokyo in January 2018 with her mother and younger brother to join the father who had moved there earlier.
She had been taken into the protective custody of a child welfare center in Kagawa twice. Another center in Tokyo tried to check on Yua in February last year, but the mother refused to let its officials see her.
A welfare ministry panel that looked into the matter concluded in a report in October that there had been insufficient liaison between the two centers.
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