-- The Miyazaki District Court on Monday ordered two former Aum Shinrikyo members and the cult's founder, Shoko Asahara, to pay a combined 15.8 million yen to a 69-year-old man the group abducted and kept under house arrest for five months in 1994.
The court said Asahara and former senior members Yoshihiro Inoue and Ikuo Hayashi should compensate the man and his family, who had sought 57 million yen in damages for emotional distress caused by the abduction.
Presiding Judge Hiroko Ando said that although Asahara did not take part in the kidnapping, he was involved in its planning.
They "inflicted psychological damage by drugging him semiconscious, abducting him and putting him under house arrest for about five months," Ando said in her ruling.