A survey of researchers on Japan's retrial system has found that all 19 respondents support a proposed ban on prosecutors' ability to appeal a court's decision to initiate a retrial.

The 19 are among 24 researchers who took a questionnaire survey because they had published papers on retrials. Japan is reviewing the retrial system designed to provide relief to victims of false charges.

In the high-profile case of Iwao Hakamata, 89, who was sentenced to death for the murder of four people and acquitted in a retrial, it took about nine years for the decision to start a retrial to become final because the prosecution appealed against the decision.