National / Crime & Legal Dec 31, 2019
At present, no prisons or detention facilities have a shortage of capacity, and the occupancy rate stands at slightly below 60 percent of overall national capacity.
National | Regional voices: Chubu Dec 27, 2019
VR builds bridge between staff and young detainees with developmental disorders in Japan
One day in mid-November, instructors at the Miyagawa medical reformatory, which treats delinquent teenage boys with developmental disorders, in Ise, Mie Prefecture, experienced how people with the disabilities perceive the world by wearing virtual reality goggles and watching a video. "Oh, it's so bright I'm ...
National Nov 14, 2019
Tokyo rally protests prolonged detention of foreign nationals at immigration facilities
A rally was held in Tokyo on Thursday calling for an end to the prolonged detention of foreign nationals at immigration facilities across the country, with a woman pleading for the immediate release of her detained husband, who is on a hunger strike. "My husband ...
National / Crime & Legal Oct 18, 2019
Japan to pardon 550,000 convicts on occasion of imperial enthronement ceremony
by Magdalena Osumi
The government on Friday approved granting pardons to roughly 550,000 petty criminals in light of Emperor Naruhito's enthronement ceremony next Tuesday. The Justice Ministry said the pardons, the first since 1993, will be granted on the premise that the emperor's enthronement is "an opportunity for ...
National Sep 9, 2019
Ex-convict-turned-writer Joji Abe, known for a bestselling humor-filled novel depicting the lives of inmates, died of pneumonia at his home in Tokyo on Monday, his family said. He was 82. A native of Tokyo, Abe joined a gangster group when he was in junior high ...
World Sep 7, 2019
In first sign of better ties, Russia and Ukraine begin long-awaited prisoner swap
Russia and Ukraine on Saturday began a long-awaited prisoner swap in a step that could ease bitter tensions over Moscow's annexation five years ago of the Crimea region. While the unfolding exchange could help build confidence between Moscow and Kyiv — formerly Kiev — and ...
World Jun 29, 2019
Jailed British-Iranian aid worker ends hunger strike in Iran
Jailed British-Iranian aid worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has ended a hunger strike in Tehran designed to push for her release, her husband told the BBC on Saturday. Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a project manager with the Thomson Reuters Foundation, began the hunger strike roughly two weeks ago. She was arrested ...
World / Politics Jun 29, 2019
Florida governor signs law allowing felons to vote, but there's a price
Florida's Republican governor on Friday signed a bill to restore the voting rights for felons who have served their time, but he wants them to pay all fines and restitution before casting a ballot, a hurdle that immediately drew a lawsuit from civil rights ...
Issues | LAW OF THE LAND Jun 19, 2019
With changes in emperors come amnesties, so who will benefit?
by Colin P.A. Jones
One convenient thing about Japanese law for those of us who are professors of it is that it is quite modern. Virtually all Japanese laws and institutions antedate the Meiji Restoration of 1868 and, of those, most have a 20th-century provenance. Compared to Anglo-American ...
National Jun 12, 2019
Hair salon at Gifu women's prison gives inmates a chance to learn new skills and rehabilitate
There's a unique hair salon in the village of Kasamatsu in Gifu Prefecture where inmates at the women's prison work as hairstylists as part of a rehabilitation project that aims to equip them with marketable skills for when they rejoin society. "It is a precious ...
World / Crime & Legal May 28, 2019
At least 42 inmates found strangled in Brazil prison gang clashes
At least 42 prisoners in Brazil were found strangled to death on Monday in four jails in the Amazon jungle city of Manaus, where a fight between rival prison gangs resulted in 15 dead the day before, authorities said. A federal task force is being ...
National / Crime & Legal May 18, 2019
Chinese court sentences Japanese man accused of stealing state secrets to 5½ years in prison
A Chinese court has sentenced a Japanese man who was detained some two years ago on charges of spying to 5½ years in prison, sources have said. The court in the city of Yantai, in the eastern province of Shandong, also ordered the seizure of ...