Principle

(The presentation in WFMH Congress in 1995 at Dublin)

I would like to introduce the principle of our nation-wide group; Japan National Group of Mentally Disabled People.

Our group was established in 1974. We are patients-only group and we are a network of individual patients and local patients' group. We are not a government-umbrella organization and every member is completely independent.

We have been publishing newsletters nine times a year, and we hope that our newsletter works as a bond of friendship. And we believe that our group's existence itself is important. Even if an individual "mental patient" accused that there has been maltreatment in one hospital, people do not believe him/her, and they say that he/she is paranoia and what he/she says is of symptom. There is a possibility that he/she might be forced to hospitalize. But if we get together and accuse the maltreatment, we can defend ourselves and people might hear our voice. In psychiatry, there is no concept of a group having disease.

During the time when our group was first established, the Japanese government had a plan to make the penal code worse, and in this plan, there was a new preventing detention system of mentally disordered offenders.

This system enabled the judge to order the mentally disordered offenders to be detained in special facilities managed under Ministry of Justice. The term of the detention was not limited. The requirements for the judge to enforce this order was as follows:

(1) one who committed a crime and is mentally disordered.

(2) suppose one did not receive medical treatments, there is a possibility that one will commit a crime again.

We "mental patients" and allies have been fighting against this new penal code. We have been stopping this system up to now. But whenever "mental patients" commit crimes, there arise campaigns to make this prevent detention system in the penal code. Thus, we can never be optimistic about the future.

We criticized this prevent detention system from the following five points of view.

(1) It is the prejudice that the mentally disordered are dangerous and have liability to commit a crime. All people the mentally disordered or not, offenders or not, have possibility to commit a crime. Why are only mentally disordered offenders detained for reason that there is a possibility to commit a crime? It is discrimination against the mentally disordered.

(2) Even if one needs medical treatments, it is not necessary to be detained in special facilities under Ministry of Justice.

(3) The heart of problem of requirements is "there is a possibility that one will commit a crime again". In this requirement one is detained for the reason that there is a possibility. Only possibility. In this prevent detention system the crime that one has not yet committed is judged. So one's character is judged. This prevent detention system is not "Hate the crime but do not hate the offender". It is "Hate the crime and hate also the offender". When one's character is judged, the purpose of this prevent detention system is not medical treatments. The purpose of it is to reform one's character. This means that the mentally disordered must be reformed the character. We reject this negative image of the mentally disordered.

(4) One principle of the penal code is that any act cannot be punished without the provision in the low. In this prevent detention system the crime that one has not yet committed is judged and the judge can order the detention. So it is against this principle of the penal code.

(5) The judge can order the prevent detention, but the judge dose not decide the possibility if one will commit a crime again or not. The psychiatrist examines a offender and he/she decides if there is a possibility or not. Then in the light of the psychiatrist's conclusion the judge decides whether he orders the detention or not. But can psychiatrists predict one's future? If they could, there would be no suicide of patients in mental hospitals. Anyone cannot predict one's future.

But we criticized not only the new prevent detention system itself, but also we criticized the ideology of it.

We believe that essence of this new prevent detention system is exclusion and forced medical treatments. And now, before making the new prevent detention system in the penal code, we are suffering from exclusion and forced medical treatments by Mental Health Low M.H.L.) and by discrimination against us.

For instance, under M.H.L. the local governor can forced one to hospitalize, when two doctors judged that one is liable to injure others or oneself. Our group has been claiming that forced treatments are not treatments and they even make one's mentally ill worse, and we have been claiming that the forced hospitalization under M.H.L. works as the social control and as the prevent detention system of us. So we have been asserting the abolition of M.H.L.

And there are many phenomena of exclusion in this society. When a member of family becomes mentally ill, other members often exclude him/her and leave him/her in the mental hospital. In the community many people hate to live with "mental patients" and they want "mental patients" to go to mental hospitals. And employers often dismiss "mental patients". In school many mentally ill students must give up studying, because many teachers do not want to deal with them and they often dismiss mentally ill students.

We lose everything, when we are labelled as "mental patients". We lose jobs, families, homes, friends and money. And doctors deny our ability, self-esteem and our real feeling.

Mental patients are excludes from everywhere, so metaphorically speaking, our national group is the last place where mental patients come and live with peers. So our group's most important principle is that we never exclude any peers.

This principle is the anti-thesis of the ideology of the prevent detention system.

We recognized importance of this principle through our practice, especially through two cases.

First, Mr.Suzuki's case. He was a member of our group. In 1976 he was killed in a prison. In cold winter, he was thrown into the strip cell. There was no heater and he was naked. The doctor of the prison injected chlorpromazine to him. Chlorpromazine affects to lower the body temperature and he was frozen to death by this injection. His mother took the State to a civil court and won the compensation for the death of her son.

In those days, we were not experienced and we could not help him. From this case, we learned that State cared nothing about mentally disordered prisoners' lives. Then we recognized how important it was to support the "mentally disordered" prisoners. The condition of "mentally disordered" prisoners is very bad in Japan.

Another is Mr.Akahori's case. He is a former death sentenced prisoner. He was flamed up as a criminal of a child kidnapping and murder. He had been imprisoned for 35 years under death sentenced, until he was sentenced innocent in the retrial court and became free in 1989.

Why he was flamed up? He was labelled as a "mentally disabled" and he was excluded from the community, so he was made to be a homeless. The police thought that the criminal of the murder must be a "mentally disabled" person, and they made Mr. Akahori be a scapegoat, because he was a homeless and did not have clear alibi. The police arrested and tortured him, and they forced a confession.

The psychiatrists examined him. And they did not hear Mr. Akahori's assertion that he was innocent. They used the documents from the police and the prosecutors and believed the forced confession. Their conclusion made the false image of Mr. Akahori. That was " He only assert innocent. He has never reflected on himself. His character is very dangerous." This false image strongly affected the sentence. The judge said in the sentence that he was "mentally disordered" and he could never adjust the society. Then, the death penalty was sentenced.

This sentence is the ultimate exclusion. When we reflect the process of Mr.Akahori's case, we can see whole structure of exclusion against the mentally disabled. So we and physically disabled had been supported Mr. Akahori. Our slogan was " If we allow the government to kill Mr. Akahori, we have no future!!"

Regrettably we cannot destroy this structure of exclusion up to now.

Recently Japanese government executed two "mentally disordered" prisoners. One in 1993 and another in this year. It is unlawful to execute "mentally disordered" prisoners. The government violated domestic low ( the code of criminal procedure) and the United Nations resolution.

In these three years the scandals of two mental hospitals were exposed. One is that a in-patient was beaten to death in Yamatogawa hospital.

Another is that a in-patients was beaten in the seclusion room, and he was severely injured in Minatogawa hospital. But these are the tip of the iceberg. In Japan the government allows or even supports maltreatment in mental hospitals.

For "mental patients" Japan is one of the worst country in the world.

Last of all I would like to stress that we "mental patients" have no freedom of expression in Japan. Now speaking in this congress, I must get over a fear of forced hospitalization. There is "liable to injure others" in the requirements of forced hospitalization. To injure others include to injure other's honour. In penal code to injure other's honour means to speak out the fact whether it is true or not.

== State Punishment and Psychiatric Tests in Japan ==

• Masao Akabori's case, a man who was in prison for 35 years as a condemned criminal but was later proven to be innocent.

Moeko Ohno & Masao Akabori

Japan National Group of Mentally Disabled People

In December 1989, the U.N. General Assembly adopted the Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights aiming at the Abolition of the Death Penalty. The same year, on January 31, Mr. Akabori was released. Flashing the V sign above his head, Mr. Akabori finally came back to this world. He was 59 years old then. It was his day of victory: he finally proved himself innocent of the charge of murderer. It was also a victory for the mentally or physically handicapped people and their supporters who had been waging a zealous, vigorous fight for justice firmly believing his innocence. Their jubilation was shared by members of the Amnesty International all over the world.

Mr. Akabori was easily framed because, having a history of hospitalization for mental illness, he was forced to lead a life of vagabond without having a job, thus it was difficult to prove his alibi. Police, prosecutors and judges plotted to liquidate Mr. Akabori. In Mr. Akabori's case it was the psychiatrists who had a decisive influence on the judges' impression. Their expert opinion concluded that Mr. Akabori "is a person who is likely to commit murder".

In the following speech, I will talk the details of Mr. Akabori's tremendously difficult fight as a condemned criminal for as long as 35 years.

A Summary of the case

The event for which Mr. Akabori was unjustly charged with murder is called the "Shimada case". On the 10 of March 1954, a six-year old girl was kidnapped from a kindergarten in Shimada, Shizuoka and later found murdered in the woods of a hill on the outskirts of the town. No significant material evidence was found. The police had only nine people who had allegedly seen the criminal, plus they had the "traces of the murderer and the little girl."

Now I will explain how police frame an innocent person. First, their investigation is conducted on the base of discriminatory presupposition. They aim at people who are viewed unfavorably in Japanese society. In the Shimada case, it was Burakumin, ex-convicts, perverts, alcoholics, vagabonds and mentally-disabled people. The police took as many as two hundred people. They were examined so severely that some of them eventually confessed themselves guilty in spite of the truth. You will realize the severity of their treatment as I describe the torture Mr. Akabori underwent.

Second, they suspected him for another case which was not related to the case in question. Mr. Akabori was questioned by policemen when he was wandering in May 1954. He answered "I'm Akabori Masao, my legal domicile is Shimada, Shizuoka.", without hesitation. After being kept for a while at a police box, he was arrested for theft by Shimada police station without a warrant. To his surprise, on getting off the train at Hamamatsu station, flanked by policemen, Mr. Akabori was exposed to a shower of flashbulbs lit by a crowd of journalists and photographers who had waited for him. Everything was already made up by the police including the story he was supposed to tell. And that was the beginning of his tragedy.

Coerced confession

Every suspect is examined in a closed room in the police station, where nobody but investigators can see or hear what is going on. So police can make their victim own up to whatever they want. Coercing the confession is the third feature of the frame-up: Mr. Akabori could not prove that he wasn't involved in the incident. In fact he was wandering when the event occurred, so he was not in Shimada. I emphasize again that there was no evidence that connected him to the case.

So how did the police frame Mr. Akabori?

I quote a part of Mr. Akabori's report he submitted to the superior judges, which is written in about one hundred thousand letters.

"They didn't allow me to go to the rest room for 16 hours. So I was kept sitting in the inquisition room and I had to wet my pants. It was too much, too cruel, too harsh of them to torture me in such a terrible way. I committed no murder. I committed no crime. Akabori Masao is an innocent, innocent man. It is impossible to talk about what I really, really didn't know. It is too much. "

Beaten and kicked repeatedly by the investigators Mr. Akabori was reduced to a physically and mentally extreme state, his mind had almost collapsed. Then the policeman uttered these words.

"If you don't know how you kidnapped and killed the girl, we'll tell you the way you did it slowly so you can understand, now listen carefully." "The two policemen told me to watch what they were doing" describes Mr. Akabori, "and showed me lots of poses and motions they made. It was the story of the crime. One policeman played the role of the criminal. Another man played the role of the girl. And the other explained what's going on."

In this way Mr. Akabori learned the outline of the Shimada case. In his report he describes also his state of mind at that time.

"I was scared of having the cruel, brutal, brutal torture like that continue. I had learned about the murder from the investigators. There was no choice so I told the story slowly to the investigator over and over again."

He explained the situation in details.

"Several investigators forced me to hold a fountain pen against my will. They hold the top of my wrist and made me write my name on the paper. They put my thumb on the vermilion inkpad [In Japan personal seals take the place of signatures. Those who don't have their seal use their thumb instead for legal documents etc.], and grasped my hand and forced me to put my fingerprint under my name on the paper against my will."

His confession was obtained forcibly by means of suggestion or direct inputting. His recollection of the process appeals strongly to our hearts giving us a vivid pictures of his experience. Police drew up thirteen versions of his confession records and prosecutors six versions. This also indicates clearly that the investigation was sloppy and the confession was unreliable. Mr. Akabori's confession was dated May 30, 1954. Torture is prohibited by articles 36 and 38 of the Constitution of Japan.

Fabricated evidence

The on-the-spot investigation was conducted within a six meters radius surrounding the place where the victim's body had been left. There was not even the slightest material evidence. The confession was necessarily fictitious and eventually revealed its inconsistency in its details.

One question was what weapon caused the wound on the girl's chest. The police thought that the criminal used a stone. Then surprisingly enough, the stone was found on June 1: two days after Mr. Akabori was forced to own up to the crime, namely eighty days after the incident occurred.

Now again let's take a look at police's way of doing things. Mr. Akabori recollects the conversation the policemen had in front of him. "One policeman said he believed I hit her with a stone or something. Another said he had searched the site and hadn't found a stone, no stone was lying on the ground. And the third policeman said you should use your head more, you go to Oi river and pick up a stone, go back to the spot and put it near the body's place (ellipses) they indeed brought a stone to the Shimada police station."

The evidence was so unashamedly fabricated in front of Mr. Akabori's face. The author can no longer find any words to comment on such an act.

The Psychiatric Test and Trial based on Discrimination

Mr. Akabori was thus put on trial.

The first session was held on July 2, 1954. On the prosecutor's reading of the indictment Mr. Akabori cried "The indictment is wrong!" and flung the document at him. From then on he consistently claimed his innocence. But judges all too often make much of a confession. It is the queen of evidence.

Meanwhile, the lawyers and Mr. Akabori's brother, Kazuo, who both believed his innocence, made every efforts to prove his alibi. They ran up against a lot of difficulties in tracing his roaming footsteps according to his letters and the rough maps he drew, in order to overturn the false confession. The trial was proceeding apace regardless of their efforts. With a desperate shortage of time, the defendant's case was apparently unfavorable.

In June of 1955, a year after the trial started, the lawyers requested the presiding judge to grant a psychiatric test. The judge agreed.

The court order issued to the experts concerned "the defendant's mental condition at the moment of the confession and at the moment of the trial". In other words the mental examiners' expert opinion had to provide the answers to the two questions: "Was (Is) he sane? " and "If insane, to what degree was(is) he so and what is the cause of his illness?".

The lawyers requested the examination because they wanted Mr. Akabori to be exempt at least from the death sentence. They hoped that the doctors would give a diagnosis of insanity, thus making him not responsible for the crime.

When the psychiatrists examined Mr. Akabori, they were provided with no data to refer to but the false confession record.

In a defense he wrote in the hospital where he was admitted for the test, Mr. Akabori claimed that his confession was drawn from him by coercion. The experts were put in a complicated position for they had to decide either to trust Mr. Akabori or the false confession. Eventually they adopted the latter. Totally ignorant of the discrimination against mentally disabled people, the doctors rejected Mr. Akabori's claim.

Here we see the most conspicuous, typical example of the attitude of doctors toward disabled or discriminated people: oppression and invalidation of their words. Now I quote Mr. Akabori's description of his horrible experience of the psychiatric test from one of his letters to me.

"The mental examiners asked me lots of questions about the case while they went through the fabricated confession record. Before the questioning they gave me a shot of anesthetic they call Isomital (same as Amytal: Amobarbital sodium). My head got foggy. I felt sleepy. Then they asked me lots of questions but I didn't know what I told them at all. Anyway, I told the doctors clearly I didn't kill anybody, I am not a criminal, but it was no use. It was just like the confession the police forced me against my will. It's too much. It's unfair."

Questioning by the use of Isomital should not be allowed on humanitarian grounds. Mr. Akabori suffered a second torture carried out at the hands of scientists in the name of science.

What is more they intimidated him. When he came to his senses, they told him "You said you killed her." I even feel dizzy learning the discriminatory attitude of the psychiatrists. They tried everything to draw from him whatever they wanted to the extent that they intimidated him by means of a lie while he denied his wrongdoing throughout the questioning, even under the effect of anesthetic.

In the report, they concluded: "The defendant shows a slight mental retardedness, he has also an emotionally unstable, extremely hypersensitive and impulsive side".

A misleading, distorted picture of Mr. Akabori was thus fixed, that had an immeasurable effect on the judges' impression as a base of their judgement.

Judges are supposed to have full discretion to make up their own impression about the defendant when they form their judgement. But in the Shimada case they looked at Mr. Akabori from a strongly biased point of view and rejected all the testimony and evidence favorable to him. The death sentence was thus pronounced.

The judgement of the district court [Shizuoka district court] stated "Such an act cannot be done by a person with a normal mind" and "It is natural to determine that the defendant had no accurate memory of when and where he was wandering, considering his intelligence which is referred to in the expert opinion.". They stubbornly insisted "There is no wonder that the defendant has quite a clear memory of an incident of such importance as this case, considering his life history" to justify the death sentence.

The principle of criminal justice is that any fact or argument has to be considered. But the principle was simply invalid and powerless in the face of the discriminatory prejudice on the side of the judges and forensic psychiatrists. Being aware of the discriminatory frame-up against him, we fought with Mr. Akabori's voice as our guide.

To conclude my speech, I would like to tell the friends all over the world. I ardently hope that you push forward our struggle for liberation with a determination not to allow any discrimination by anyone against mentally disabled people, and to be united with and learn with the friends under more cruel discrimination, remembering that the air they are breathing and that we are breathing are the same.

Thank you very much.

Presented at World Congress of World Federation of Mental Health at Finland in 1997

(Translated by Ryo Hagitani, Kyohei Imai, and Damon Brewster)

(Rearranged by Kenji Sato for this web site.)