On June 4 the Tokyo High Public Prosecutors Office freed a 62-year-old man who had served 17 years of a life sentence for the 1990 kidnapping and murder of a 4-year-old girl after a new DNA test suggested that he was innocent. Acknowledging that the DNA test result serves as new evidence that would likely to exonerate Mr. Toshikazu Sugaya, the prosecution said it would not object to a retrial.
Mr. Sugaya had long sought a retrial, and now his acquittal appears certain. It is clear that basic errors were committed during the initial investigation. Both the police and the prosecution should determine where their investigation went wrong and resolve not to repeat the errors.
A 4-year-old girl went missing from a parking lot of a pachinko parlor in Ashikaga, Tochigi Prefecture, on May 12, 1990, and was found dead beside a river the next day. A year and a half later, the Tochigi prefectural police requested that Mr. Sugaya come in for questioning. On the first day of questioning he reportedly confessed to the crime after he was informed that a DNA test had identified him as the perpetrator.