A former Aum Shinrikyo lawyer was sentenced to 12 years in prison on Wednesday for attempting to kill attorney Taro Takimoto with sarin gas in May 1994.

The Tokyo District Court also found Yoshinobu Aoyama, 40, guilty on eight other charges, including slandering a company president, harboring Aum fugitive Takeshi Matsumoto and submitting false documents to local authorities.

Prosecutors in December demanded that an unrepentant Aoyama be sentenced to 15 years.

Presiding Judge Toshio Nagai said Aoyama played an indispensable role in Takimoto's case by issuing orders to other cult members at the scene and by providing important details, such as the victim's schedule, for the attack.

The defendant also took pills that prevented him from being poisoned by sarin and made sure his accomplices did the same, Nagai said.

"Although there is not enough evidence to conclude that the defendant knew the liquid was actually sarin, it is clear he knew it was a toxic substance and could kill Takimoto," he said.

The defense claimed Aoyama did not intend to kill Takimoto, from Kanagawa Prefecture, because he did not believe the substance that was released was deadly.

Commenting on other charges that involved his work as a lawyer, the judge said the defendant abandoned his responsibility as a lawyer and continued to commit unlawful acts over a long period of time.

According to the court, cult founder Shoko Asahara ordered Aoyama and four other followers in May 1994 to murder Takimoto, a lawyer supporting former cult members and their families. Asahara allegedly considered him an obstacle to the cult. Asahara is on trial for several crimes but has yet to be convicted of any of them.

Aum members allegedly applied liquid sarin to the windshield of Takimoto's car while he was attending a trial in a civil case against the cult before the Kofu District Court in Yamanashi Prefecture, the court said. Takimoto experienced difficulty seeing when he drove his car home later.

Aoyama falsely claimed at a January 1995 news conference that a local agricultural chemical company released poison gases at the cult's Kamikuishiki complex in Yamanashi Prefecture, it said.

In another case, Aoyama also submitted a false document to local authorities to obtain real estate in the village of Namino, Kumamoto Prefecture. And when senior cult member Kiyohide Hayakawa, 50, and Aoyama were arrested, the defendant asked a certified public accountant to falsely testify for the defense team twice in 1992, the court said. In the same trial, Aoyama allegedly submitted a forged document to the court to bring it in line with the testimony.

The former lawyer also told Matsumoto, 34, to hide in hotels in Ishikawa Prefecture and provided him with 5 million yen between March and April 1995 to help him evade arrest.

Aoyama pleaded not guilty to the attempted murder of Takimoto but admitted other charges. During the trial he often refused to answer questions from prosecutors since they "did not know a thing about Aum's doctrine."

A graduate of Kyoto University, Aoyama became a lawyer in April 1984. His registration was nullified in June 1995 following his arrest the previous month.