Nathan's Sentencing July 5th at 2pm
Darlene:
As expected Yuki Ito did not appear in court today. The judge read her written statement. In her statement she spoke about herself for almost 4 pages with rants such as she is sure if Nathan is free than he will try to kill her or her family. Her family is scared of foreigners, Nathan tells people he will change but he will always be a deadbeat Dad. She said that although his brother had come to Japan and testified for Nathan the reality is that Nathan and his brother do not have a relationship and in her opinion the Teutle family will do nothing to help Nathan, which causes her worry because she feels unsafe. She would like the court to protect her from Nathan furthermore she hopes that Yukari never sees Nathan and in the the future she will do everything she can to protect Yukari from Nathan, everything horrible in her life has happened and as a result of his family etc.etc.etc. No one was expecting a love letter and I don't want to give her any more air time what so ever but since she wasn't there to read the letter I thought it might be appropriate to provide everyone with a picture to go with the story Also it is important to remember here that she is not the victim in legal sense for these crimes as Yukari's mother she is only considered a representative for her daughter the person who was kidnapped.
It continues to amaze me the amount of power Yuki Ito has with regard to this criminal (not civil case). Her attorney sits beside the prosecution feeding him questions and quite often answers as well!!
The closing arguments were then heard from both sides. The prosecution spent a great deal of time saying how Nathan changed his story from one thing to another therefore his testimony was unbelievable. Some truth there since he didn't understand questions lost in translation. They dwelled on his wife's allegations that he was a deadbeat father , the unsubstantiated allegations of domestic violance and that Kumiko Ito's testimony is more believable than Nathan's. The prosecution asked the judge to come back with a 2 year prison sentence.
The defence followed and I must say Mr. Ohashi did a very good job of bringing things back to point. With regard to the forced entry charge he said that although Nathan had on a knit hat he did nothing to conceal his identity, he announced himself at the door, his mother-in-law opened the door and knew it was Nathan, he did not say he was a delivery person and furthermore at that time his Japanese was so poor that he wouldn't of been able to say he was a delivery person convincingly in Japanese. Mr. Ohashi contended that the mother-in-law let him in the house when he rang the bell and more importantly he was registered to live there as written on his alien registration card. Mr. Ohashi asked Nathan be found innocent of both the assault and forced entry charges. With regard to the kidnapping charges he asked that Nathan receive a suspended sentence.
Lastly Nathan was able to speak on his own behalf. He apologised to his wife, her family and his daughter for all the trouble that this has caused everyone. He said that he came to Japan because he liked Japan and he stayed because he wanted to make a life for he and his family. He is so sorry that this has happened. He would like to get back to work as soon as possible and would like to support Yukari financially for as long as necessary.
The opinion around the courtroom today among people more knowledgable than me (for sure) is that a request of a 2 year prison term as opposed to 10 years gives the Judges an opporuntity to suspend Nathan's sentence. Requesting anymore prison time than that would make it difficult for the judges to come back with a suspended sentence. So the hope is that he will get a suspended sentence. A suspended sentence ruling would mean that Nathan would released to Immigration transported to Tokyo and would be deported to Mexico. The Mexican police with the co-operation of the Mexican Embassy in Tokyo have provided Nathan with documents showing he has no criminal record in Mexico, therefore when he enters Mexico he will enter as a free person. Nathan's sentencing is on July 5th at 2pm. I think things went well and I am cautiously hopeful.
Nathan felt everyone's support today!! Both near and far THANK-YOU!!!
