In 1988, Okamoto killed two investment company executives and robbed them of approximately 100,000,000 yen (USD 900,000). He was found guilty of intentional robbery-homicide and his death sentence was finalized in 2004.
In a retrial filed in the Osaka District Court in 2008, his attorneys insisted, "the murder was decided after the robbery and that the death penalty or even life imprisonment were not inevitable sentences." The attorneys claim the charges could have been reduced to robbery, and murder, rather than intentional robbery-murder. Three successive retrials were denied.
A fourth appeal was filed. Unfortunately, Okamoto was executed in December, 2018, pending the fourth appeal. The following year, the appeal was rejected.
Posthumous appeals in Japan are not rare. The suit alleges that due to the execution, the prisoner cannot be visited, and therefore the search for new evidence has been permanently obstructed. After the filing, attorney Naoki Ikeda spoke at a news conference. "There are many lingering doubts regarding the final verdict, and a retrial is necessary to exhaust the arguments. Can an execution be allowed when retrials are currently filed? We need to expand the discussion of this issue."
Michael H. Fox
Japan Innocence and Death Penalty Information Center
(jiadep.org)
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