I Fought The Law

I figure a year is a long time not to have at least one run in with the law, so let's talk about Japan's legal system! If you're been keeping up with the news of late, you've probably heard of how Japan is in the midst of transitioning to a citizen-juror system. That's right... up until now the Japanese have gotten away without the time-honored inconvenience that we Americans know as jury duty. (I actually think jury duty would be cool, but that's just me.)

First off, we should go over the court set-up since it's a little bit different from that of the U.S. If you look above, you can see the public prosecutor on the left and the defendant's attorney on the right, talk about showdown. In the back, the three professional judges in the middle are flanked by six citizen judges. When witnesses give testimony, you'll notice they sit facing the jurors (scary!) and not the general public.

Citizens jurors are reserved only for more heinous crimes so if you do have any legal problems you shouldn't have to deal with twelve jurors (hopefully). From what I gathered from an NHK documentary on the new system, citizen jurors are wary of being too lenient and usually end up being more harsh in their sentencing than the professional judges so watch out!

As a field trip, the law class went to Yokohama's regional courts and watched a few cases. It was a cool experience, but also kind of sad. The first case we saw was against a homeless man who rode in a taxicab without paying because he wanted someplace warm to stay. (Sidenote: Japanese cabs are really clean and comfortable so I can totally sympathize.) Another was against a woman who had illegally entered Japan and was working with a bogus visa/passport since what she could make working in Japan in a week added up to about what she could make in one or two months back home. It was actually her second or third(?) conviction for the same offense so the public prosecutor was pretty adamant (read: harsh) about getting it across that she would not be allowed in Japan again. Sigh.

On a second field trip with the law class, we met with a public prosecutor and got to talk to him a little bit about his job experience. I'd say the most amusing part was his story on how he decided on his career path... because he read a really cool manga where the lead character was a public prosecutor. All the more reason to stop by Book-Off more often I suppose- maybe I'll find my true calling.