Hakamada was 30 years old. The year was 1966. The US and Soviet Union were locked in a Cold War space race, Star Trek was in its first season and Japanese factories were busy pumping out a consumer gadget that would power its economic boom: colour televisions.
Nearly five decades later the Soviet Union is a relic of history, Star Trek is a global franchise, while Japan’s world-beating economy is recovering from 20 years of tepid growth. And Hakamada, once a professional boxer, is a frail old man who spends his days in a solitary prison cell.
The 77-year-old is believed to be the world’s longest-serving condemned inmate, a man supporters say has lost his grip on reality while awaiting death by hanging—or old age—even as questions over his guilt emerge.
Japan's death row prisoners have no set date for their execution and are placed in solitary confinement once imprisoned. There is little if any human contact and they are not allowed to communicate with their fellow inmates.
A prisoner learns of their impending execution mere hours before it's to take place and their families aren't notified until after the execution has taken place
Japan has a conviction rate around 99 percent and claims of heavy-handed police interrogations persist under a long-held belief that a confession is the gold standard of guilt.
Last year, a Nepalese man was freed after spending 15 years behind bars in Japan for a wrongful murder conviction while, in 2009, an inmate serving the 17th year of a life sentence for a kidnapping-murder was released after DNA testing proved he was wrongfully convicted based on a false confession.
“I truly believe Iwao didn’t do it. But once police suspect you for a crime, that’s the end of the story. It was like that back then, it is like that now,” his sister said.
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