Six JCO Co. employees received suspended sentences Monday for professional negligence resulting in the deaths of two coworkers in a 1999 nuclear accident.
The Mito District Court gave Kenzo Koshijima, 56, who was head of JCO's Tokai plant at the time of the accident, a three-year sentence, suspended for five years, and a fine of 500,000 yen.
The other five employees were handed suspended prison terms ranging between two and three years, for the sloppy operating procedures that resulted in the fatal accident in Tokai, Ibaraki Prefecture.