Former TV reporter appeals ruling in Japan #MeToo case

A former television reporter is appealing a civil court ruling that ordered him to pay damages to Japanese #MeToo symbol Shiori Ito in a high-profile rape case.

Noriyuki Yamaguchi, a former Washington bureau chief for TBS TV and a biographer of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, has denied Ito’s allegation that he had sexual intercourse with her without her consent at a Tokyo hotel in 2015 while she was in a state of intoxication and unconscious.

The Tokyo District Court last month ordered Yamaguchi, 53, to pay ¥3.3 million in damages to the 30-year-old Ito, who is also a journalist.

The court rejected a counter lawsuit filed by Yamaguchi seeking ¥130 million in compensation from Ito. He claimed his social reputation has been damaged by her remarks.

Ito filed a criminal complaint with police, but prosecutors dropped the case in 2016.

She later filed a complaint with the Committee for the Inquest of Prosecution, but it judged in 2017 that the prosecutors’ decision was appropriate.

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