A Japanese court on Friday sentenced a 61-year-old man to 14 years in prison for a drunken driving accident that left two elementary school children dead and three others severely injured near Tokyo last year.
The Chiba District Court found Hiroshi Umezawa guilty of driving under the influence of alcohol when he crashed into a group of pupils heading home from school on a street in Yachimata, Chiba Prefecture, in June last year.
In the trial, prosecutors condemned Umezawa for what they said was one of Japan's worst-ever cases of drunken driving, demanding 15 years in prison for him.
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The court found that Umezawa had continued to drive drunk since 2020 at the latest.
"Although he had to keep safety in mind as a professional driver of a heavy truck, he continued to drive drunk easily," Presiding Judge Daisaku Kaneko said in handing down the ruling.
Umezawa admitted to the charge of dangerous driving resulting in injury or death and apologized to the bereaved families. The defense counsel asked for leniency, saying he is remorseful.
Bereaved family members expressed their reluctance to accept the ruling, saying the maximum 15-year jail term sought by prosecutors already felt inadequate, and that they cannot understand why the eventual sentence was an even shorter 14 years.
Prosecutors pointed out that Umezawa often drove under the influence of alcohol, drinking even while working. Before the accident, he drank 220 milliliters of "shochu" distilled liquor he had bought at a convenience store, they said.
Alcohol in excess of the legal limit was detected when he took a breathalyzer test after the accident, police said.
Two boys, aged 7 and 8, respectively, were killed in the accident while two other boys and a girl were seriously injured.
Umezawa drank alcohol at a rest area on an expressway during work around 3 p.m. on June 28, 2021, before driving on a street in Yachimata around 3:30 p.m., where he dozed off and crashed into the group of school children, according to the ruling.
