Japan's Supreme Court has finalized a ruling ordering a former senior television reporter to pay journalist Shiori Ito 3.3 million yen ($24,000) in damages over a high-profile rape case that helped spark Japan's #MeToo movement.

The top court upheld a Tokyo High Court ruling in January favoring Ito, saying Noriyuki Yamaguchi, a 56-year-old former Washington bureau chief for Tokyo Broadcasting System Television Inc., had sexual intercourse with her without her consent in 2015. The top court's ruling was dated July 7.

Photo taken in December 2019 shows Japanese journalist Shiori Ito, seen as a symbol of the "#MeToo" movement in Japan. (Kyodo) ==Kyodo

Ito, 33, has said she was raped at a hotel while unconscious following a dinner in Tokyo with Yamaguchi, who had promised to help her get a job. The defendant claimed the act was consensual.

At the same time, the top court also upheld the high court's decision, which ruled in favor of Yamaguchi, ordering Ito to pay him 550,000 yen for defamation.

The high court said her claim in a book that he might have drugged her was not credible.

Ito had sought 11 million yen in damages over her rape, and Yamaguchi countersued, seeking 130 million yen in damages for harming his reputation.

The ruling from the court's No. 1 Petty Bench, presided over by Justice Atsushi Yamaguchi, recognized Ito's claims of sexual assault.

The top court's ruling cited the high court's acknowledgment that Ito and the former TV journalist did not have a close relationship and that Ito consulted doctors and police immediately after the incident.

After the incident, Ito had filed a criminal complaint with the police, but prosecutors opted in 2016 not to indict the accused on insufficient grounds for suspicion. The Committee for the Inquest of Prosecution also decided it was appropriate not to prosecute.

Ito has said she believes the defendant's close ties with recently deceased former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, about whom he wrote a best-seller, might have discouraged prosecutors from pursuing the case.

After unveiling her real name and publishing a book in 2017 about her experience of sexual assault, Ito became a symbol of Japan's #MeToo movement. Her decision attracted significant sympathy and criticism in a country where few victims come forward.


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