Two former executives of the now-defunct Snow Brand Foods Co. pleaded not guilty Wednesday to charges of fraudulently obtaining 200 million yen in subsidies under a government beef buyback program by falsely labeling meat.
In their first trial session before the Kobe District Court, Hiromi Sakurada, 61, and Masami Inoue, 60, denied conspiring to defraud the government by passing off foreign meat as domestic.
"I did not plan to swindle money or conspire to do so," said Sakurada, who served as a senior managing director of the food company.
Inoue, a former managing director, told the court: "I learned of the fraud (perpetrated) by our employees after the case was uncovered."