YOKOHAMA (Kyodo) The Yokohama District Court dismissed pleas Thursday on behalf of five people now deceased in a retrial over the wartime "Yokohama Incident," in which journalists and others were convicted of promoting communism.
By dismissing the case, the court avoided any judgment on whether the five were guilty of violating a notorious 1925 law.
Relatives of Toru Kimura, Eizaburo Kobayashi, Hiroshi Yoshida, Kenjiro Takagi and Toshio Hiradate argued the five were framed and sentenced for violating the Peace Preservation Law. The sentences were handed down in 1945, shortly after the end of World War II.