The Tokyo District Court on Thursday sentenced a former vice president of Yakult Honsha Co. to seven years in prison and fined him 60 million yen for engaging in illicit transactions of "Princeton bonds" over the past decade.
Naoki Kumagai, 72, was convicted of aggravated breach of trust, fraud and other charges.
Kumagai, a former official of the National Tax Agency before joining Yakult in 1979, pleaded guilty at his first trial session to tax evasion involving the bond transactions, but he pleaded not guilty to aggravated breach of trust, fraud and other charges.