Doctor convicted over girl's death in high-speed driving crash

Why was the sentence suspended?

Sorry, but going 120 on a surface street through intersections is a fatal accident waiting to happen. That nine year old girl won't get another chance at life. This guy should've gone to jail.

Why was the sentence suspended?

Probably paid a lot of cash to the family.

120km in a 50km speed limit, yet it's the dead girl's car fault for not checking the road.

Japanese legal system is a joke.

120km in a 50km speed limit, yet it's the dead girl's car fault for not checking the road.

Japanese legal system is a joke.

The legal system did not find that it was the girl's fault, so I think maybe you might want to find someone to translate the article into your first language?

Why was the sentence suspended?

a doctor...

Give the suspended sentence to the driver of the minicar and let the doctor spend 3 years in prison. It makes no sense that a serious case of irresponsibility gets a slap in the hand just because other people were at fault as well.

Why was the sentence suspended?

Written in the article.

But the court gave Takakura a suspended sentence, as the driver of the minicar neglected to properly check for oncoming traffic before making a turn, the judge said.

Its ridiculous that even in cases where a child is killed due to willful recklessness like this the perpetrator can walk free with a suspended sentence.

Victim blaming. Three years for the death of a 9-year-old girl is a joke. Suspending the sentence is an absolute insult.

120km in a 50km speed limit, yet they cite the dead girl's car for not checking the road as a mitigating factor to reduce his sentence so he doesn't have to serve jail time.

Japanese legal system is a complete joke.

The driver of the 'kei' minicar could not reasonably expect an oncoming vehicle to be traveling at more than double the posted speed limit; therefore was not neglectful and no fault should have been judged.

When the woman turning looked for cars IF she saw this car in the distance she would assume she has enough time to turn before he get to her. If he was doing 50kph there would have been plenty of time for her to turn. but at 120kph that gap closes up pretty dam quick. I seldom make judgement but I see this as being his fault entirely.

Appalling that a little girl dies because a freak is driving with such speed but it's the little girl's driver at fault. Suspended sentence. This guy should be beaten by everyone who knew the girl and then dumped in the slammer for life. This makes me sick.

Did he also lose his license to practice medicine?

"It is often said that the exact phrase "First do no harm" (Latin: Primum non nocere) is a part of the original Hippocratic oath."

But the court gave Takakura a suspended sentence, as the driver of the minicar neglected to properly check for oncoming traffic before making a turn, the judge said.

Well, at first I was unsympathetic to the speeding doctor, but here it turns out the K-car was turning into oncoming traffic? Even at 50 kph, that is asking for a collision.

The dead 9-year-old girl did nothing. Wrong place, wrong time. If the doctor had not been speeding he would have been able to stop.

wallace

The dead 9-year-old girl did nothing. Wrong place, wrong time. If the doctor had not been speeding he would have been able to stop.

You simply do not know that. Riding a bike here, getting T-boned is my worst fear. And that can happen at 50kph, I have seen it.

Suspended? That’s an absolute disgrace.

Once again, I despair at the Japanese “justice” system.

ZaphodToday  10:25 am JST

wallace

The dead 9-year-old girl did nothing. Wrong place, wrong time. If the doctor had not been speeding he would have been able to stop.

You simply do not know that. Riding a bike here, getting T-boned is my worst fear. And that can happen at 50kph, I have seen it.

But if the doctor was doing 50kph when he hit the womans car the crumple zones on the car would have absorbed the impact, thats what they are designed to do but at 120kph on a sideways hit not a chance.

He got off way easy. If he had any foreign connection, he would have paid a hefty fine and gotten twenty without a suspension. Traveling at that rate of speed was THE cause of the accident. What a travesty!

The comment above I did not grey off the next paragraph

wallace

If the doctor had not been speeding he would have been able to stop.

That's not how the road law works. The doctor didn't need to stop. He is certainly guilty of driving recklessly, but regardless of how fast he was going he absolutely had the right of way over the other car that was turning and crossing traffic. As tragic as this accident was, the driver of the kei car did have the responsibility to spot and yield to any oncoming vehicles regardless of how fast or slow they may be going. Whatever the doctor was doing, e.g. speeding, driving under the influence, etc. doesn't absolve the kei driver from his failure to yield.

Is this a freaking joke? By the time you take 2 seconds to look to the left and look to the right, a car moving at 120kph would appear out of nowhere? The speed limit was 50 for the reason being you can see a car moving at that speed and react to it in time??

It seems posters here are just learning that fault is attributed by percentages to each party in accidents.

Maybe if they spent time learning how the world worked, they wouldn't be so surprised an enraged when they hear about something that works the way it's always worked.

Why just a slap on the wrist for the murder of a child?

Ridiculous.

If the kei driver saw the speeding car at say 50 meters away, then that's plenty of distance to safely turn.

If the speeding car was travelling at the speed limit of 50 km/h then it would take 3.6 sec to arrive, allowing sufficient time for the kei car to safely turn.

As the speeding car was travelling at 120 km/h that same 50 meters would only take 1.5 secs to meet the kei car.

As all drivers know, there is a vast difference in what a few seconds means.

This happened to me years ago when I turned in front of a motorbike that was yonks away but travelling at hyper-speed and reached me in a wink of an eye, Thankfully he was skilled / lucky enough to go around me, avoiding a horror story.

I'm not a slow driver but that freaked the beejeeezus outa me.

I can understand how the articles incident could have easily happened at such speeds on local roads.

Driver A - driving 120km/h in a 50km/h zone.

A young girl dies.

Apart from some social stigma driver A gets to go on with his life as normal.

I cannot accept this.

I hope driver A sees that girl’s face every morning when he wakes up and every night before he sleeps and I hope that he is haunted by it for the rest of his life. That’s the very least punishment he deserves.

USNinJapan2

wallace

If the doctor had not been speeding he would have been able to stop.

That's not how the road law works. The doctor didn't need to stop. He is certainly guilty of driving recklessly, but regardless of how fast he was going he absolutely had the right of way over the other car that was turning and crossing traffic. As tragic as this accident was, the driver of the kei car did have the responsibility to spot and yield to any oncoming vehicles regardless of how fast or slow they may be going. Whatever the doctor was doing, e.g. speeding, driving under the influence, etc. doesn't absolve the kei driver from his failure to yield.

Even if the doctor had the right of way if he had not been speeding he could have stopped in time to avoid the collision. He was found responsible in part and sentenced.

Vehicular manslaughter is never murder.

On the face of it, easy to judge.

A 'suspended sentence' means that he now has a prison record, a heavy burden in Japan, but he does not have to physically serve it and can be a useful doctor in the meantime. If he offends in any way for the next five years the previous lenience shown will be removed. Perhaps commentators here are thinking that he could have been more useful as a prison doctor?

Not making excuses for his driving through Fukuyama at 120 kph, but he did at least have the right of way, and the car turning right without seeing his approaching car, and without judging his speed, (don't we all check the speed of other cars?) and just being there in a light Kei car, have to be some of the contributory factors to the poor child's death. Such mitigating factors all work towards the shape of any final sentencing in Japan.

The article does not give details on factors affecting visibility, such as whether this was on a straight section of road or curved, and who was or was not wearing a seatbelt, though.

Not making excuses for his driving through Fukuyama at 120 kph, but he did at least have the right of way, and the car turning right without seeing his approaching car, and without judging his speed, (don't we all check the speed of other cars?) and just being there in a light Kei car, have to be some of the contributory factors to the poor child's death. Such mitigating factors all work towards the shape of any final sentencing in Japan.

But no matter what it is having "right of way" doesn't excuse illegal acts. 'He was texting and driving but had right of way so it's all good.' 'He had more than a few drinks but had right of way when this crash happened so he is not at fault the other person who was sober and not breaking the law is the one at fault here.' Like that is how crazy all of that sounds when anyone is trying to put any blame onto the mother.

Ken

No one is saying that the doctor is blameless or that the fact that he had the right of way excuses what he did or that he is largely to blame for the tragic accident. What we are saying is that he is not entirely (100%) responsible and that some of the responsibility lies with the kei car driver for his negligence as the Japanese Road Law applied to him in this instance. And this is what many here are failing to understand or accept as a mitigating factor in the sentencing.

Many details are missing from this story. Checking the Japanese news, it seems that the judge's decision to suspend the sentence was motivated by the negligence of the kei driver when turning right into the intersection, and quite importantly, by the fact that the girl was not wearing a seat belt, which largely contributed to the tragic end.

That’s a tragic sidenote to the story.

I will never understand how such a generally very safety conscious country as Japan has such a lax attitude to child and infant seat belt / safety seat implementation. And, why the police don’t seem to bother about it.

Despite this new information, I still fully believe the speeding driver should have received a custodial sentence.

Big surprise... a doctor kills a kid and gets a suspended sentence. And then they blame it on the driver of the other car to boot. TIJ.

But the court gave Takakura a suspended sentence, as the driver of the minicar neglected to properly check for oncoming traffic before making a turn, the judge said.

I don't like this ruling. If someone was traveling at the speed of sound, would I still be responsible for not seeing them when turning onto the street? The guy was going twice the speed limit - he is the one that broke the law.

The prosecution should appeal against the judge’s verdict-it is far too lenient.

I see so much reckless driving on Japanese roads but not may cops.

Sure, there are worse places to drive but Japan is almost like a 3rd world country…

And having driven over 200 kms so far this week, I’ve seen quite a few infringements.

This guy got away with murder.

Since all doctors take an oath to save life, his doctor's license should be revoked, never allowed to practice again.

Then he should go to jail for at least five years.

This judge sleeps well at night I bet. I'm sure he has a strong sense of justice. (Not!)

A three-year prison sentence, suspended for five years, for negligence resulting in injury and death. That is all the death of an innocent little girls life meant to this monster of a judge.....Is he still practising? And the doctor, he knew what he was doing and that he coud cause an accident, but he did not give one jot, he did not care. He shoud have gotten at least 10yrs inside with no parole and lost his doctors licence. I do not attach much blame to the driver of the little car, the speed this lunatic doctor was driving did not give her much of a chance.