Ministers reluctant to OK full videotaping of suspects' questioning+

TOKYO, June 5 Kyodo -
Justice Minister Eisuke Mori expressed reluctance Friday over requiring police
and prosecutors to fully audiotape and videotape the questioning of criminal
suspects.
Mori spoke a day after a 62-year-old man serving a life sentence for the 1990
murder of a 4-year-old girl was freed from prison after 17 years in jail as
prosecutors told a high court they will accept a retrial because recent DNA
analyses highly likely prove his innocence.
The man, Toshikazu Sugaya, says he was forced by investigators to confess
although he was innocent.
State Minister Tsutomu Sato, who oversees Japan's police forces as chairman of
the National Public Safety Commission, also expressed reluctance about the
so-called full ''visualization'' of suspects' questioning by investigators.
While also taking a cautious stance, however, Chief Cabinet Secretary Takeo
Kawamura said at a press conference, ''People might say that it had not
happened'' (that Sugaya served time in prison for a false accusation) if
questioning of him had been videotaped.
''I believe we should take this issue seriously,'' the government's top
spokesman said.
Mori, who has jurisdiction over prosecutors, said at a regular news conference
that full audio and video recording of the questioning could cause suspects to
hesitate to give testimony and ''could also pose an obstacle to revelation of
the truth.''
He said there is a need to introduce plea-bargaining and wiretapping in
addition to conventional depositions from suspects for a sweeping review of
investigative methods in Japan.
Japanese police and prosecutors have already started partial audio and video
recording of the questioning of criminal suspects on a trial basis.
Sato, speaking at a separate news conference, apparently indicated he is ready
to review the current partial recording, saying, ''It cannot be said that
everything is okay as is done at present.''
The Japan Federation of Bar Associations, saying investigators' questioning
behind closed doors is a hotbed of a series of wrong convictions in Japan, has
called for enactment of a law requiring full visualization.
Opposition Democratic Party of Japan acting leader Azuma Koshiishi has called
for an early passage of a bill intended to revise the Code of Criminal
Procedure to realize full visualization.
Koshiishi, also leader of the DPJ caucus in the House of Councillors, made the
call during a general meeting of the party's upper house members.
The bill, which was introduced by the opposition camp in April, has already
passed the opposition-controlled second chamber but no deliberations have taken
place in the more powerful House of Representatives.
Justice Minister Mori declined to comment directly on the release Thursday of
Sugaya, who had been convicted of kidnapping and murdering the girl and is now
virtually certain to be declared innocent in a retrial.
''Personally, I have something to say about it, but I'll refrain from making
any comment as justice minister,'' Mori said.
Police comptroller Sato, who was a Tochigi prefectural assembly member at the
time of Sugaya's arrest in 1991, said he had received briefings from the police
about the case and that the prefectural police, in his memory, had established
firm evidence to arrest the suspect.
''I think the police did their best at that time. But the result was that (the
release of Sugaya),'' he said. Sato also said he takes seriously the
prosecutors' decision to release Sugaya.
Meanwhile, Susumu Yanase, chairman of the DPJ Diet Affairs Committee in the
second chamber, told reporters Friday that his party plans to summon Sugaya as
a witness to appear before the house's Judicial Affairs Committee as part of
efforts to look into problems involving investigators' questioning of suspects.
==Kyodo