JAPANESE JUSTICE

Evening Star, Issue 17311, 26 March 1920, Page 8

JAPANESE JUSTICE

.■>OM"Jv CURIOUS CUSTOMS

"Criminal trials in Japan are public, but not blatantly so," says Mr U. (.). Matheson m an article on the. procedure in Japanese Courts, written from Tokio for the 'New York Herald.' Only persons who can show that they have n good reason for vvishing to gain entrance are admitted. Not only are visitors admitted with reluctance, but there seems to be a disposition to keep out lawsuits as well. Thus a lumber of cases which in America would furnish an excuse for protracted grinding of the judicial mill are settled in Japan liv the policemen on their beats or at the Molice station. The police inspectors in charge have the power to exercise a wide discretion. Ordinary " drunks," of whom there are very few, considering how many shops sell intoxicants, are simply kept long enough to sober up, and are discharged with a stern warning. Domestic squabbles are settled by the oolicemen on the beats. Street brawls are rare, and offenders are usually made to perforin profound apologies to each other md the nolice, and are let go. Other •ninor offenders are punished by the scare ihe inspectors are always able to cause ..hem, while the more serious violators of aw are passed on to the headquarters of •he metropolitan police, and thence into 'he local courts.

Once he has been sent to headquarters a prisoner's troubles begin. As a preliminary to all eke he is photographed and Inger-printed, a decided reversal of the American principle, which bars a man from the "Rogues' Gallery" until he has 'leen convicted of a felony. From the ohotograph room and the inkpad the prisoner passes on for his "examination," a legalised third degree, held in an underground tooqi, where, without benefit of ■ •ounsel, he is severely ,! examined," perhaps for several days in succession, tough Uve law prohibits 'the holding of a man without a definite charge for" more than hours. A similar law is evaded in America by rearresting the prisoner at the J ud of each day. but in Japan they keep the fact of a suspect's arrest a secret, and there is no booking to help inquiring friends, if any are foolish enough tu run their own necks into a noose.J>y making inquiries. The examinations are legal, however, and arc always held "in camera," following which the prisoner is either released or committed for trial.

The Jaranese Bench usually consist of four Judges, one of whom conducts the questioning of the prisoner. With the Judges sits also the Public Prosecutor, and a few feet away, facing the Bench, is the desk for the lawyer for the defence! Judges and lawyers are all gowned in stiff black costumes, and all wear caps of black crape. The handling of the prisoners is pure Japanese. Delivered at the courthouse for trial, they are marched from the public waggon in single file, handcuffed, an 3 tied' together by a stout rope that circles each man's waist and is twisted through his obi. Their gaol kimonae are of dull drab, and on their sockles.s feet are grass sandals, in which, they flop through the corridors. The most unusual feature of all to a stranger is the fact that each prisoner has his head covered by a wicker mask, more like an inverted waste-paper basket than anything else, the object of which is to prevent recognition of the prisoner, to permit him to hide his shame under the disguise, and, very possibly, to prevent the whole file from making a bolt for liberty. The sight of a prisoner so arrayed is ghastly, the mask bringing up the suggestion of the hangman's cap. Once in the prisoner's box the masks are removed, while the prisoners sit with deeply-bowed heads in an attitude of the utmost humility

Japanese Courts have the name of being fail', anrl the Bench is honest. A recent charge of spit? made against one of the procurators in Kobe was so much of a rarity that it attracted attention all over the empire, and was investigated immediately with a thoroughness that left no i; round for suspicion of sympathy on the part of the Bench srenerally.