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The Utsunomiya District Court in Tochigi Prefecture on Wednesday convicted two men over the illegal disposal of a body after they dumped the body of a young woman in a cardboard box near a quarry in Sano on Aug 4.
The body was subsequently identified as that of Kana Shiratsu, 16, from Kitamoto in Saitama Prefecture, who had disappeared from a juvenile community home in Ageo City in 2012.
The court sentenced Toru Kuribayashi, 30, to 2 1/2 years in prison, suspended for five years, and his accomplice, Haruyuki Iwasaki, 45, an unemployed homeless man, to two years, suspended for five years, TBS reported.
The court heard that Shiratsu's remains were wrapped in a futon, and stuffed into a cardboard box. A forensic examination revealed that she had been dead for approximately three days when her body was found.
Iwasaki turned himself in to the police station, while Kuribayashi was arrested after being put on a nationwide wanted list. The court heard that Kuribayashi met Shiratsu on an Internet site.
An autopsy showed that the girl died of an overdose of mind-altering drugs.
© Japan Today
17 Comments
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avigator
No DNA test for sexual abuse? Was she a minor? Killing somebody gets a lighter sentence than stealing a penny from a temple.
Jeff Huffman
Convicted of just illegal dumping? Gee, might not they want to probe into this a little deeper and see if, you know, they might have caused her death as well?
And it's unlikely that the girl died of "mind-altering drugs" because hallucinogenics rarely cause death and you certainly wouldn't be able to determine that three days after the fact.
Disillusioned
Eh? They both got suspended sentences and no jail time? Are they f'ing serious? The girl's family must be fuming! As above, a guy got a year in jail for stealing ten yen from a temple. These two get suspended sentences for mirdering a young girl and dumping her body? WTF!!!!
Alistair Carnell
Both got away with suspended sentences, sickening ! You'd get more for defacing a political campaign poster here.
SaitamaRefugee
Japan: where killing someone gets you less time than drugs. Let's not Aska's deal 3 year sentence, suspended for 4 years. Well done!
gogogo
16 year old girl dies of drug overdose and the two guys that probably gave it to her and more get off?
nath
There doesn't appear to be any proof that these guys killed her, or gave her the drugs. Only that they dumped her body.
Magnus Roe
Mind altering drugs doesn't just mean "hallucinogenics". Analgesics, stimulants and hypnotics also fall under this category, all are quite likely to kill people.
Sounds strange that a court would hand down suspended sentences to two guys who tossed a dead kid into a quarry though.
Moderator
Readers, please note that the two defendants were only charged with illegal disposal of a body and not with causing her death.
Dennis Bauer
And how do we know that the drugs were not administered to her under duress? To make here more willing?
lucabrasi
@Dennis
We don't know. So the men weren't charged. It'd be a pretty sick judicial system that prosecuted people for "don't knows".
nath
They should have brought the body to a proper disposal facility. Then all would be well.
noypikantoku
poor judiciary system! investigate more maybe she was forced and was drugged and maybe that caused her death... because she was from a juvenile community home so nobody cares.
Cricky
Suspended sentence and suspended investigation this is not a medieval society because even medieval society would have been more thour rigorous in its investigation and punishment.
Badge213
Who says there wasn't a test, but remember this crime was illegal dumping of a body. As you know usually these charges are later upgraded to murder/manslaughter as it is standard procedure to charge someone with illegal disposal of a body before they get upgraded to another charge or trial of murder/manslaughter etc.
Brian Wheway
she went missing in 2012, so where has she been since then? what about the DNA evidance, was she held as a sex slave or something? was she raped ? load of questions need to be asked, if they were involved with her murder, the sentence should be a lot higher.
WA4TKG
"Safety Japan "; Yeah, RIGHT, unless you're a youngster.