Akita woman faces 15 years for killing 4-year-old son who disturbed her date

Actually compared to most places with over 50 million people it is way safer. We in Japan feel these crimes are numerous but this kind of thing happens every week in the US. Every week. In Texas or California alone. In the US every crime doesn't make the national news as in Japan because there is only so much space in the paper and so many states. People are murdered everyday and it never makes the national news. In Japan everything like this hits the national news. For Americans Japan is a tiny little place. Hell even Australia is big but only 30mil people or so. So lets stop using the death of this little kid and other crimes to say how Japan is not so safe. For me the chances of being murdered are waaaaaaaaaaayyyyy lower here than in my hometown of only 100,000 people. And I can point you out to my home town newspaper and show you the deaths every week.

 

...the 15 years. That means, she will get less.
I hope this horrible person will fall in an irrigation ditch and suffocate. Disgusting.

 

It would be extremely nieve to think that every crime or even 10% of crimes are reported here in Japan. Take suiside for example, 30,000 a year, that makes an average of about 80 people a day. Murder is unreported and burried on a daily baisis, no pun intended. These crimes are intentionly kept out of the news. A better test is to check the arrest stats by local police.

 

The 15 years is only the prosecutors' request - she hasn't been sentenced yet. Accordingly, the headline is a little misleading - should be "Akita woman faces 15 years for killing 4-year-old son who disturbed her date, if judge agrees with prosecutors' demand". I suspect the actual sentence will be less than ten years, if similar cases are anything to go by.

Has the Akita woman accused of killing her daughter and a wee boy who lived nearby gone on trial yet?

 

"Absolutely. I read the news in Japan regularly. This sort of thing happens so rarely"

I guess relatively speaking, it might happen rarely, but in the metropolitan, tokyo, kanto area, you can read about at least one serious incidient every two weeks...and those are only the ones that make the news. I'm sure a case could be made that child abuse occurs more often in the U.S., but that would probably be due to just the greater population. Child abuse is cracked down on very hard in the states now a days, they take that stuff almost as serious as a terrorist.

In just the last 2 years, I have personally witnessed 3 incidents of out-right child abuse, all of them by the father, while the mother just ignored it, like nothing was happening. I can't imagine how many unreported incidents take place.

 

Good valid point. Thanks for info.

 

these incidents have become the norm, with only a precious few reported. want a full view of child abuse in japan? then go to:

http://www.crnjapan.com/abuse/en/

 

Japan is number 60 (USA is number 24) in murder rate worldwide.

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_percap-crime-murders-per-capita

So perhaps the low reporting rate reflects reality?

 

blackpassenger: these incidents have become the norm, with only a precious few reported. want a full view of child abuse in japan? then go to...

First, these incidents have not become the norm. I have plenty of neighbors with kids and have yet to see or suspect abuse from any of them. My experiences aside, Japan passed a law not so long ago stating that teachers, health care workers, medical workers and social workers were obliged to report cases of abuse and neglect or suspected cases of abuse and neglect. What happened was that the rates went through the roof. What common sense should tell you is that it was due to the new law not a sudden downturn in the parenting skills of the average Japanese person.

That said, Japan does have relatively low autopsy rates compared to many other industrial countries and this was a problem in the 80's when trying to accurately report and find the causes of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrom), so it is highly possible that abuse goes undetected. Still I think it's a bit ridiculous to say incidents such as the one in Akita "are the norm"

ghoul ...We in Japan feel these crimes are numerous but this kind of thing happens every week in the US. Every week. In Texas or California alone. In the US every crime doesn't make the national news as in Japan because there is only so much space in the paper and so many states. People are murdered everyday and it never makes the national news. In Japan everything like this hits the national news. ...

Who is this "we in Japan"? Kindly speak for yourself please and not all 125,000,000+ of us. You don't really think every crime is reported in Japan do you, even abuse and murder? There are plenty of kids who are abused and neglected, who've run away from home and are living as prostitutes in Japan and you'll rarely if ever read about them. According to one scientific magazine (Forensic Science International) 90,000 people go missing every year in Japan. Do you think they've all just walked off? As for reporting in the U.S., one I can guarantee you that crime is reported and reported on more in the U.S. than in Japan and that sensational cases make the headlines in both countries. That you don't read about them speaks more about your reading habits than what is reported.

 

thats good. 15 years is the correct sentence so long as it is non parole. the boy friend should be given 5 - 10 years too. Interrupting their date huh? these people must have been on drugs or an alcohol binge etc. still, no excuses. Lock em up.

 

As already mentioned, I was being sarcastic. Obviously it doesn't carry well on the internet. I assumed (wrongly) that Deva was too. I was in disbelief that anyone could think parents abusing children was rare in Japan.

I will be interested to see what punishment this woman actually does get.

 

when murder (crime, period) was practically nil in Japan.

Japan still has a way to go before she catches up with the U.S.

I left Japan, for good, 14 years ago. I believe, from reading JT news that crime has increased ten fold.

 

people think japanese are polite but i think murdering your own son is impolite.

 

Child abuse is strong in many a country. As an American I am realistic about crime statistics. The US may publicize more but there is still more that isn't. That said my point was for all these "Japan is as dangerous as everywhere else" people. I know i get tired of the US being "dangerous" in the eyes of many Japanese. Well I feel safer in Japan no matter where I am and this in in comparison to a city (my hometown)of less than 100,000 people. Japan is safer than the US period. Safer than most. That said there is a problem with people taking their own lives and that of their families which is sorry and weak.

 

What is needed in this case is a good ol' dose of Texas justice.