A high court scrapped on Tuesday a lower court ruling and acquitted an assistant nurse over a 2013 incident in which an 85-year-old woman at a care home in central Japan died after eating a doughnut she was given.
The Tokyo High Court found 60-year-old Kesae Yamaguchi not guilty of negligence, saying her provision of a doughnut as a snack did not violate a duty of care under the Penal Code.
In March last year, the Matsumoto chapter of the Nagano District Court found Yamaguchi guilty of negligence resulting in death after recognizing she was responsible for checking what food the woman was given, as her snack had been designated as jelly. The court fined her ¥200,000 ($1,894).