The Tokyo High Court has thrown out an appeal by the widow of a supporter of former Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi demanding the return of shares in NTT DoCoMo Inc. from the late prime minister's chief secretary, her lawyer said Monday.
The court threw out the case because the plaintiff, who asked the media not to use her name, failed to pay the necessary fees for it to proceed. The widow, from Takasaki, Gunma Prefecture, had demanded Toshitaka Furukawa return shares in the mobile phone giant, claiming he swindled them from her husband.
The woman insisted that around 1973 her husband was given 4,000 shares in Jomo Tsushin Service, a Gunma-based predecessor of NTT DoCoMo, by people close to Obuchi, who was a Gunma native.
She claimed the stock was transferred to her and another member of her husband's family after he died in 1974.
The case was originally filed in March 2000, but the Tokyo District Court ruled against her in November, saying her husband's possession of the shares could not be confirmed.