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Kyodo News
March 26, 1998
On March 26, the Supreme Court, chaired by Chief Justice Mitsuo Saito, dismissed a final appeal by Shinchosha Co., Ltd., over a libel action. A man from Tomokomaki City, Hokkaido, had filed a libel suit against the publishing company claiming that his reputation had been damaged by an article in Shukan Shincho about a car accident in which he was involved. The Supreme Court upheld the verdicts of the district and high courts and rejected Shinchosha’s appeal, confirming the publisher’s defeat in the case.
The article in question had focused on an accident that occurred in Otaki Village in July 1994, in which a car driven by a priest of Nichiren Shoshu collided with the plaintiff’s truck, resulting in the priest’s death.
The article was carried in the September 1, 1994, issue of the weekly magazine under the headline “Soka Gakkai leader kills a Taiseki-ji priest in car accident.”
The Sapporo District and High Court had both acknowledged the justice of the libel suit, respectively announcing their verdicts as follows:
“The article implies the possibility that the accident was intentionally caused by Soka Gakkai related people,” and “The suspicion that the story was from the start intended as an attack on the Soka Gakkai cannot be removed. Moreover, it unfairly damaged the plaintiff’s reputation.”
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