Central Japan Railway Co. (JR Tokai) on Monday appealed a district court ruling ordering it to pay 49 million yen in compensation to the family of a teenage boy who died in a 1995 accident at Mishima Station on the Tokaido Shinkansen Line.

Takao Watanabe, head of JR Tokai's Shinkansen bullet train services, said in a release that the operator "cannot accept some points raised in the ruling and would like to seek a judgment from a higher court."

The appeal, against a ruling by the Shizuoka District Court's Numazu branch, was filed with the Tokyo High Court.

The Numazu court ruled that JR Tokai failed to take sufficient safety measures such as installing TV monitors to observe passengers on platforms, saying the firm was negligent in the death of Yusuke Kawarasaki, 17.

On hearing of the appeal, Yusuke's father, 46-year-old Yasuo, said, "JR Tokai has not apologized to our bereaved family and is even going to exacerbate our suffering" by appealing.

On Dec. 27, 1995, Yusuke boarded the Kodama 475 from Tokyo for his home in Fujinomiya, Shizuoka Prefecture.

He got off at Mishima in the prefecture to make a quick phone call to his father. But while attempting to jump back into the train as the doors were about to close, his finger got caught in a door. He was dragged for about 150 meters and was killed when he fell to the tracks.

His parents filed a suit in June 1996, seeking 170 million yen in compensation for the accident, which was first involving a passenger death since Shinkansen services began in 1964.

While the parents blamed JR Tokai for failing to take measures to prevent such an accident, the operator argued that sufficient precautions were taken and attributed the accident to Yusuke's hurried attempt to board the departing train.