The 77-year-old boss of a major yakuza crime syndicate was sentenced to life in prison by a Japanese high court on Tuesday, overturning a lower court decision that had imposed the death penalty on charges related to four attacks, including murder.
In the sentencing, Kudo-kai leader Satoru Nomura was acquitted of the 1998 fatal shooting of a former head of a local fisheries cooperative in the southwestern prefecture of Fukuoka. However, he was found guilty of three cases of attempted organized murder against a former police officer, nurse and dentist between 2012 and 2014.
Based on circumstantial evidence, the Fukuoka District Court ruled in 2021 that Nomura masterminded all four attacks.
Nomura, who was arrested with Kudo-kai's No. 2, Fumio Tanoue, in 2014 over the 1998 murder, has pleaded not guilty to all charges against him.
Fukuoka High Court Presiding Judge Futoshi Ichikawa said Tuesday that overturning the 1998 ruling was "inevitable," citing a lack of evidence that Nomura conspired to commit murder.
At the time of the 1998 murder, Nomura led an affiliate group of Kudo-kai's predecessor organization, and the group's decision-making process has been "uncertain," the judge said, separating the case from the other three attacks, which occurred after Nomura became leader of Kudo-kai.
The judge acknowledged Nomura's involvement in all three cases, mirroring the lower court's findings.
On Tanoue, who was also tried for his involvement in the four cases, the high court ruling upheld the lower court's decision sentencing the 67-year-old to life in prison.
After pleading not guilty at the lower court, Tanoue reversed his earlier statement at the appellate court and admitted he had instructed two of the attacks -- against the nurse in 2013 and the dentist in 2014. He denied that Nomura gave instructions or approved the assaults.
But Ichikawa rejected Tanoue's statements, finding them to be unreliable.
The defense counsel for Nomura and Tanoue said it appealed the high court's rulings on Tuesday.
Tsuyoshi Iwashita, the head of the Fukuoka Prefectural Police, vowed to continue efforts to "eradicate" Kudo-kai in a statement issued following the high court ruling.
With its members implicated in numerous shootings against law-abiding citizens, Kudo-kai, based in Kitakyushu in Fukuoka Prefecture, was designated by local public safety commissions as a particularly dangerous gangster group in 2012.
Its membership has decreased over the years, counting around 160 as of the end of last year compared to a peak of some 730 at the end of 2008.
"We will continue to promote various measures, starting with the campaign to expel gangsters," Kitakyushu Mayor Kazuhisa Takeuchi said in a statement.
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