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7 US-China Law Review 1 (2010)
Impact of the Popular Legal Participation on Forced Confessions and Wrongful Convictions in Japan's Bureaucratic Courtroom: A Cross-National Analysis in the U.S. and Japan

handle is hein.journals/uschinalrw7 and id is 400 raw text is: US-China Law Review, ISSN 1548-6605, USA Impact of the popular legal participation on forced confessions and wrongful convictions in Japan's bureaucratic courtroom: A cross-national analysis in the U.S. and Japan* 1 2 Hiroshi Fukurai , Kaoru Kurosawa (1. Department of Sociology, University of California, Santa Cruz 95064, U.S.A.; 2. Department ofSocial Psychology, Toyo University, Tokyo 112-8606, Japan) Abstract: The interrogation and lengthy detention of the accused by Japan's police and prosecutors without access to legal counsel has generated many forced confessions in Japan's criminal court. As results, past research estimated that a large number of innocent people have been falsely convicted, and some of them were even executed for crimes they have not committed. Since almost all of indicted cases result in convictions in Japan's criminal court, allegations of wrongful convictions have raised serious human rights issues, and the use of forced confessions in criminal proceedings has long been criticized by families of the accused, their attorneys, legal scholars, citizen activists, and international human rights groups. This paper examines whether or not the 2009 introduction of the Saiban-in Saiban (the quasi-jury trial), where ordinary citizens deliberate together with Japan's bureaucratic judges, helps prevent instances of wrongful convictions. As Japan's high conviction rate has substantiated that the Japanese court may be another bureaucratic system that is more interested in preserving its own authority and maintaining the status quo, the infusion of non-bureaucratic legal participants into the traditional judicial process may create the potential to alter the nature of trial processes, the quality of deliberations, and thus ultimate outcomes of criminal trials. Based on interviews and survey responses from Japan's grand jury (i.e., Kensatsu Shinsa-kai, or prosecutorial review commission (PRC)) participants and American citizens who served in jury trials, the paper explores the ways in which civic participation in criminal processes may affect the quality of legal decision making in Japan's criminal court. Key words: lay participation in legal decision making; confession; jury; saiban-in; substitute prison systems; wrongful conviction 1. Introduction I was completely stripped naked in a dark cell of Hyogo Prefectural Police Headquarter, and the experience This research was supported by the University of California, Office of President, Pacific Rim Research Program (Award#:19900-485212) and Abe Fellowship from SSRC. Assistance with the design of the study to collect information from the Prosecutorial Review Commissions Society in Japan was offered by Naoko Tamura of Waseda University School of Law, Satoru Shinomiya of Kokugakuin University School of Law and late Kiichi Hirayama of the Japanese Prosecutorial Review Commission Society. For assistance with collecting and processing the data reported herein, we wish to thank Sheri Kurisu. Diana Lopez, Horacio Sanchez, Theodore Cha, Mauricio Orantes, Lora Verarde, Phuong Mai, Hector Garcia. and Fanta Summers for their valuable assistance. At the Dallas County Courthouse, we received helpful cooperation and oversight from Court Jury Services Manager Lori Ann Bodino and Attorney Arthur Patton. Hiroshi Fukurai, Ph.D.. professor of sociology and legal studies. University of California. Santa Cruz, CA. U.S.A.. Kaoru Kurosawa, Ph.D., professor in Department of Social Psychology, Toyo University, Tokyo, Japan. July 2010, Volume 7, No.7 (Serial No.68) I

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