The Nagoya District Court sentenced a 34-year-old man Monday to 16 years in prison for killing a man who saw the defendant's car collide with another vehicle last year and tried to stop him from fleeing the scene.
According to the court, the car driven by Kiyomi Takahashi from Nagoya collided with a truck at an intersection in Higashi Ward, Nagoya, on the morning of Dec. 18.
Takahashi tried to drive away from the scene, but Shinichi Matsumoto, a 41-year-old passerby from Komaki, Aichi Prefecture, stood in front of Takahashi's car to stop him. Takahashi ran over Matsumoto and dragged him nearly 300 meters, killing him.
The presiding judge said Takahashi, who was drunk at the time, tried to kill the man purely to protect himself.