The Hiroshima High Court on Monday raised the amount of damages to be paid by a man sentenced to death for murdering five people and injuring 10 others in a 1999 rampage at JR Shimonoseki Station in Yamaguchi Prefecture, but following a lower court ruling did not assign responsibility to the man's parents or West Japan Railway Co.
Nine plaintiffs had been seeking a total of 200 million yen in damages from Yasuaki Uwabe, 42, his parents and JR West. Uwabe is currently appealing his death sentence to the Supreme Court.
Uwabe drove into the station concourse in a rental car in the late afternoon of Sept. 29, 1999, mowing down seven pedestrians. He then proceeded to stab passersby inside the station with a knife.