Prosecutors demanded the death sentence Wednesday for a gangster accused of assassinating Nagasaki Mayor Itcho Ito last April.
Tetsuya Shiroo, 60, pleaded guilty when his Nagasaki District Court trial opened in January, but did not clarify his motives for shooting Ito, only saying, "I didn't have any personal grudge against him."
Shiroo stands accused of shooting Ito, 61, twice with a pistol on the evening of April 17, 2007, near the mayor's election campaign office in front of JR Nagasaki Station. Ito died 6 1/2 hours later in a hospital.
Shiroo, who started having financial difficulties from around 2005, blamed the city and the mayor for his troubles, believing they stemmed from the city's refusal to compensate him for a car accident at a city road work site and to extend loans to a construction firm that provided his main source of income, the prosecution said.