Aum Guru’s prison life still mystery as gallows near

January 24, 2018

Tokyo- Mystery surrounds the Tokyo prison life of Chizuo Matsumoto, the guru of the now-defunct Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult, even as he appears to be approaching the gallows.

Last week, the Supreme Court effectively cleared the way for imposing capital punishment on Matsumoto, 62, after it upheld an indefinite prison term for the last remaining Aum Shinrikyo suspect over the cult's 1995 sarin attack on Tokyo's subway system and other crimes.

Meanwhile, a rare glimpse of his prison life was recently provided by the prison operator following an inquiry from a family court linked to proceedings started by one of his daughters.

Matsumoto retains his ability to hear and physical functions and suffers no psychiatric disorder, the operator said in response to the inquiry connected with an inheritance-related claim by Matsumoto's fourth daughter against her parents. She told a press conference last November that the claim had been accepted the previous month.

The inmate, whose death sentence became final in September 2006, gets exercise, takes baths and accepts health checks, but he adamantly refuses to meet visitors, according to the operator.

During his initial trial at Tokyo District Court between 1996 and 2004, he pleaded not guilty, insisting that the cult's series of crimes were committed by his followers.

"I ordered them to stop, but they won," he also said. He later met questions in the court with silence.

Matsumoto received visits by family members from 2004, but has not met any visitors including his lawyers since 2008, according to a report submitted to Tokyo High Court from a psychiatrist who interviewed the death-row inmate, and other sources.

He is also said to have started using diapers on a daily basis in 2001 after showing signs of incontinence.

During his appeal trial after the district court sentenced Matsumoto to death in February 2004, his defense lawyers claimed that he was incapable of standing trial and should be given medical treatment.

The high court rejected the claim, however, based mainly on the psychiatrist's report and an interview with Matsumoto by judges.

Japan's Code of Criminal Procedure stipulates that the execution of a death-row inmate be deferred if the convict is mentally incompetent. A senior Justice Ministry official said there is "no problem" over sending Matsumoto to the gallows.

Including the once-revered guru, a total of 13 former senior Aum Shinrikyo members have received death sentences.

The ministry basically refrains from carrying out capital punishment if there is any possibility that a death-row inmate will be asked to appear in court as a witness.

For former cult members on death row, this possibility effectively disappeared after the top court's ruling against Katsuya Takahashi, 59, last week. The ministry is beginning in earnest to consider carrying out their death sentences.

It appears that the ministry will not necessarily stick to a tradition of suspending death sentences for those whose retrial petitions are pending.

Matsumoto and at least seven other former Aum Shinrikyo death-row inmates have yet to get the results of their latest retrial petitions. Another is preparing to submit a retrial petition.

In July last year, the ministry broke the tradition for the first time in 18 years, by executing an inmate with a pending retrial petition, his 10th. Two inmates on their third and fourth petitions, respectively, were hanged in December.

Matsumoto's current plea, filed by his family, is the fourth.

"We don't have a position of refraining from capital punishment due to retrial pleas alone," Justice Minister Yoko Kamikawa has said. Jiji Press