Local gov't ordered to pay damages to acquitted ex-assistant nurse

The Mainichi

17-07-2025

OTSU (Kyodo) -- A Japanese court on Thursday ordered a local government to pay a former assistant nurse about 31 million yen ($209,000) in damages after she was acquitted of murder in a retrial over the 2003 death of a patient.
Mika Nishiyama, 45, spent 12 years in prison after she was convicted in 2005 of killing the male patient at a hospital in Shiga Prefecture by removing a ventilator tube. The Otsu District Court dismissed her compensation claim against the central government.
Nishiyama had sought a total of around 55 million yen from the state and prefecture in a damages suit filed in 2020 with the court, arguing the police had withheld evidence and she had been induced to make a false confession.
She was acquitted earlier that year, with the district court saying it was highly likely the patient died of natural causes. It also said Nishiyama's statements during the investigation were unreliable and she may have been manipulated by an investigator.
According to her complaint, police induced Nishiyama, who has a mild intellectual disability, to make false statements by taking advantage of her romantic feelings for the investigator.
It also asserted the police did not disclose a document suggesting the patient had died of suffocation due to phlegm blockage.
The central and local governments had both urged the court to dismiss the claim, with the prefecture denying police intentionally withheld evidence or induced Nishiyama to make false statements, while the state argued the indictment was not unreasonable.