TOKYO (AP) 鈥 Japanese prosecutors said Tuesday they will not appeal the acquittal of the world鈥檚 longest-serving death-row inmate in a retrial last month, bringing closure to the 1966 murder case after more than a half-century of legal battles.
Prosecutor-general Naomi Unemoto said the prosecution decided not to appeal the Shizuoka District Court decision that found Iwao Hakamada 58 years after his arrest, saying: 鈥淲e feel sorry for putting him in a legally unstable situation for an extremely long time.鈥
Hakamada, an 88-year-old former boxer, was found not guilty on Oct. 26 by the Shizuoka court, which concluded that police and prosecutors collaborated in fabricating and planting evidence against him. The court said he was forced into confession by violent, hourslong interrogations.
The top prosecutors鈥 decision to not appeal two days before the Oct. 10 deadline finalizes Hakamada鈥檚 acquittal by the district court.
鈥滻鈥檓 delighted that we finally resolved this. Case closed,鈥 his 91-year-old sister Hideko Hakamada told reporters after getting a phone call from her lawyer about the prosecutors鈥 decision.
鈥淚 kind of knew this was going to happen,鈥 Hakamada said, with a laugh.
Unemoto, in a statement on the Supreme Public Prosecutors Office website, also apologized for Hakamada's decades-long unstable legal situation amid a lengthy court process and pledged to investigate why the retrial took so long. She expressed dissatisfaction over the court decision that investigators had fabricated evidence.
Hakamada was convicted of murder in of an executive and three of his family members and setting fire to their home in central Japan. He was sentenced to death in 1968 but was not executed, due to the lengthy appeal and retrial process in Japan鈥檚 notoriously slow-paced justice system.
His acquittal became official on Wednesday when the Shizuoka prosecutors office submitted the paper waving the right to appeal.
The Shizuoka prefectural police chief, Takayoshi Tsuda, told reporters he hoped to directly apologize to Hakamada. He expressed regret for the victims' families that the case ended without finding the culprit.
Hakamada became the fifth death row inmate to be found not guilty in a retrial in postwar Japan, where prosecutors have a more than 99% conviction rate and retrials are extremely rare.
He spent more than 45 years on , making him the world鈥檚 longest-serving death-row inmate, according to Amnesty International.
With Tuesday鈥檚 settlement of the retrial ruling, Hakamada is now entitled to receive government compensation of up to about 200 million yen ($1.4 million).
His lawyer Hideyo Ogawa has said his defense team is considering filing a damage suit against the government and the Shizuoka prefecture over the collaboration of prosecutors and police in fabricating evidence, despite knowing it could send Hakamada to the gallows.
