Lay judge system to kick off Thursday amid lingering concerns+

TOKYO, May 20 Kyodo -
Japan from Thursday will join many other countries in having a system that
makes ordinary citizens try criminal trials, but its prospects are shadowed
amid concerns including what some experts call excessive lifetime secrecy
obligation imposed on the so-called ''lay judges.''

The first trial attended by a panel of professional judges and lay judges is
expected to be held in late July at the earliest following necessary
procedures, with eyes fixed on whether the new system can bring a change to a
trial process criticized for being too abstruse and out of touch with popular
sentiment.
Seeking ''faster, friendlier and more reliable'' administration of justice, the
lay judge system focuses on courtroom exchanges rather than traditional lengthy
out-of-court perusal of investigative records.
''We must humbly listen to opinions that public understanding (over the system)
is not enough...but there is a strong hope toward an open justice and I think
we need to first make a step,'' top government spokesman Takeo Kawamura told a
press conference Wednesday.
The public will be participating in trials for the first time in Japan since a
jury system was operated between 1928 and 1943, which was suspended amid the
rise of militarism. Okinawa had a jury system under U.S. occupation after World
War II, which lasted until 1972.
Under a law that will take effect Thursday, in principle, six citizens,
randomly selected from among eligible voters, will examine serious criminal
cases, such as murder and robbery resulting in death, together with three
professional judges at district courts.
Lay judges will also participate in determining the sentence, including the
death penalty. In that sense, the system is different from the jury system in
such countries as the United States and Britain, in which the jurors are
basically involved in deciding guilt or innocence and judges determine the
sentence.
The lifetime secrecy obligation imposed on the lay judges over the content of
closed-door deliberations is also criticized by some as ''too strict'' compared
with U.S. jurors, who are allowed to talk freely about such content after a
trial ends.
The Japanese law on lay judges sets a maximum penalty of six months in prison
or a 500,000 yen fine if they leak such information as who said what during the
deliberations.
Such an issue has also drawn the attention of some ruling and opposition
lawmakers, which formed a group on April 1 to seek reviewing the system
although the law was enacted in 2004 after a unanimous vote in the House of
Representatives.
The group has argued that heavy punishments for lay judges violating the
secrecy obligation could prevent them from blowing the whistle on mishandling
of trials by professional judges.
They also find it a problem that constitutionally guaranteed freedom of thought
and principle may not be accepted as reasons for lay judge candidates to refuse
to serve, as there is no such stipulation in the law.
In another sign of remaining concerns, a separate group consisting of lawyers,
former prosecutors and a former judge held a press conference Wednesday to urge
the state to not start the system, noting there are no constitutional grounds
to allow citizens to serve as judges.
Taro Okubo, a former judge at the Tokyo High Court and member of the group,
said lawsuits that would question the system's constitutionality will
eventually be filed once it starts.
The lay judge law stipulates that the government will review the system, if
necessary, three years after its introduction.
Criminal cases for which indictments are filed from Thursday onwards will be
tried under the new system. Following the indictment, legal professions will
engage in a ''pretrial arrangement procedure'' that aims to narrow down the
arguments and evidence to keep the trial period short for the conveniences of
the lay judges.
The procedure, involving prosecutors, defense lawyers and professional judges,
is expected to be completed as early as mid-June for cases with few points of
controversy. Courts will then call up about 50 to 100 lay judge candidates for
each case.
Japan's lay judge system was proposed in June 2001 by a government judicial
reform panel, which concluded that public understanding and support for the
justice system will be deepened by having the ''sound social common sense of
the public'' reflected more directly in judgments.
Behind the move were calls from the business world in the 1990s to enhance the
role of the judiciary in settling disputes in an era of deregulation as well as
question marks over the criminal trial process following a series of retrials
in the 1980s that overturned finalized capital cases.
The overturned cases mainly involved forced confessions obtained during
closed-door questioning by investigators.
Other criminal procedures have also shown a change prior to the start of the
lay judge system, such as the partial videotaping of questioning to ensure
greater transparency of investigations.
==Kyodo