Japanese Prosecutor Arrested for Fabricating Evidence

Tokyo, Sept. 21 (Jiji Press)--Japan's Supreme Public Prosecutors
Office on Tuesday arrested a prosecutor on suspicion of fabricating evidence
seized during an investigation into a high-profile postage discount scandal.
Arrested was Tsunehiko Maeda, 43, chief of prosecutors at the Osaka
District Public Prosecutors Office who investigated the case related to the
abuse of a postage discount system for organizations serving the disabled.
In the scandal, welfare ministry officials were arrested on
suspicion of issuing a fake certificate to help an organization which
falsely claimed itself as a group for the disabled win postage discounts.
But one of them, Atsuko Muraki, 54, former director-general of the
ministry's Equal Employment, Children and Families Bureau, was acquitted due
to poor evidence.
The supreme prosecutors' office said it will not appeal the verdict
issued by Osaka District Court on Sept. 10 that found Muraki innocent. The
ruling has now been finalized.
Welfare minister Ritsuo Hosokawa restored Muraki to the ministry
Tuesday.
Maeda is suspected of revising the date of data stored on a floppy
disk, which the Osaka prosecutors' office seized on May 26 last year at the
home of Tsutomu Kamimura, 41, who used to work as junior staff of Muraki.
The date of the final update on the disk, which contains data of
the fake certificate that Kamimura allegedly issued, was altered to June 8,
2004, from June 1 that year.
The alteration was made on July 13 last year, shortly before the
Osaka prosecutors' office returned the confiscated disk to Kamimura's side
on July 16.
In the trial of Muraki, prosecutors claimed that she told Kamimura
in early June 2004 to issue the fake certificate. Maeda made the alteration
apparently to ensure the date of the final update would not contradict their
allegation.
Maeda has acknowledged to investigators at the Osaka prosecutors'
office that he changed the data on the disk, but he has denied he did it
intentionally, informed sources said.
Testimonies made in Muraki's trial have already revealed other
problem practices at the Osaka prosecutors' office.
A former boss of Muraki was coerced into signing a statement that
prosecutors compiled based on nonexistent evidence, while prosecutors
discarded memos on their interrogations related to the case despite the
supreme prosecutors office's instruction to keep such materials.
Maeda has been known as an ace in the Osaka prosecutors' office
with experience in many major incidents, including a campaign finance
scandal involving a political fund management body for Democratic Party of
Japan heavyweight Ichiro Ozawa.
On Tuesday, a lawyer for former Public Safety Intelligence Agency
head Shigetake Ogata said he will file a criminal complaint against Maeda
over a fraud case involving a pro-Pyongyang group.
The lawyer for Ogata, who has been ruled guilty of conspiring to
swindle the group, claims that Maeda lied in court over his client's case.
END