By Hyo-Jin Paik
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

TOKYO, Japan – Amnesty International published findings that Japan’s practice of informing inmates of their execution only a few hours before they take place have caused death row prisoners to become mentally ill.  The Japanese government is now under pressure to abolish their capital punishment system.

Kate Allen of Amnesty said, “The mental anguish of not knowing whether each day is to be your last day on Earth is terrible…[b]ut Japan’s justice system…sees fit to bury its death row prisoners in the most punitive regime of silence, isolation and a sheer non-existence imaginable.”  She urged the Japanese government to “[r]ather than persist[ing] with a shameful capital punishment system, [they] should immediately impose a moratorium on all further executions” because being informed only a few hours before execution is “utterly cruel.”

Japanese prisoners.  Courtesy of Getty Images.

Japanese death row prisoners are held in isolation, and they are not allowed to speak to other inmates.  In addition, prisoners on death row are not allowed to move around except for the weekly exercise sessions and must remain seated in their cells.  Visitations from family and attorneys can end in as little as five minutes.  Consequently, many inmates become delusional and suffer from mental illnesses.

Amnesty’s report highlighted the case of Iwao Hakamada, former professional boxer, who has been on death row for 41 years.  He is considered to have been the longest condemned death row prisoner in the world.  A psychiatrist who met Hakamada diagnosed him with “institutional psychosis.”

32 men were executed between January 2006 and January 2009 in Japan.  17 of the 32 executed inmates were older than 60.  Five were in their 70’s, which made them the oldest executed prisoners in the world.  Japan currently has 102 prisoners on death row.

International human rights standards forbid imposing capital punishment on the mentally ill.  The Japanese criminal procedure code also states that executions should be halted if a person receives the death sentence and is mentally insane. 

However, the death penalty has had wide support in Japan, where conviction rate for criminals is 99%. 

For more information, please see:

BBC – Japan death row ‘breeds insanity’ – 10 September 2009

Guardian – Prisoners driven insane on Japan’s death row, says Amnesty – 10 September 2009

Huffington Post – Amnesty International: Japan Must Stop Executing Mentally Ill Prisoners –11 September 2009