An artist's impression of the trial. (Mainichi file)
HIROSHIMA -- Prosecutors again demanded the death penalty for a juvenile who was convicted of strangling a mother and her baby daughter in Yamaguchi Prefecture in 1999, during their closing argument at the Hiroshima High Court on Thursday.
The highly publicized case was sent back to the high court after the Supreme Court dismissed in June last year a lower court ruling that handed the now 26-year-old man life imprisonment, saying the decision was too lenient.
The defendant, whose name is being withheld under the Juvenile Law because he was 18 when he committed the crime, maintained during the latest trial that he hovered over the victim, Yayoi Motomura, because she reminded him of his late mother and that he had sex with her after her death "in order to bring her back alive."
However, prosecutors argued that his explanation was too abrupt and a weak distortion, saying, "It is clear that the defendant changed his confession repeatedly in accordance with the results of forensic and psychiatric evaluations," prosecutors said.
"The pretext offered by the defendant is only an excuse, and there is no reason to spare him capital punishment," said prosecutors.
The defendant was convicted of murder and rape resulting in death for strangling 23-year-old Motomura, and her 11-month-old daughter Yuka, at their home in Hikari, Yamaguchi Prefecture, on April 14, 1999.
During the latest appeal, the defendant denied his intention to kill Motomura, maintaining that he found himself choking her after he tried to put her down because she resisted. Prosecutors, however, claimed that it was clear that he intended to kill her because he kept pressing her neck with his bare hands for more than five minutes.
（Mainichi Japan） October 18, 2007