Tokyo Electric Power Company Executives Acquitted of Negligent Homicide in Fukushima Nuclear Disaster Case

Supreme Court Upholds Acquittal After Lower Courts' Not Guilty Verdicts

On the 6th, the former Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) executives who were tried on charges of negligent homicide related to the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident that occurred in March 2011 were acquitted.

According to Kyodo News, the Second Petty Bench of the Supreme Court of Japan, equivalent to South Korea's Supreme Court, dismissed the appeals of former Vice Presidents Takekuro Ichiro and Muto Sakae on the previous day.

Earlier, the first and second trials had ruled them not guilty, stating that "the accident was not foreseeable." Additionally, former Chairman Katsumata Tsunehisa, who was indicted along with them, passed away in October last year, resulting in the dismissal of the prosecution.

Yonhap News

At that time, the TEPCO executives were not prosecuted by the prosecutors in 2013. However, citizens used a system called 'citizen prosecution' to bring charges against them.

Citizen prosecution is a system where, if a prosecution review commission composed of ordinary citizens decides that a case, which prosecutors have decided not to prosecute, should be prosecuted, a court-appointed lawyer files charges against the suspect.

The prosecution lawyer argued that 44 patients in nearby hospitals who could not evacuate in time due to the TEPCO executives' failure to take appropriate measures during the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident died, and thus prosecuted them.