Photo/Illutration Toyota Motor Corp.’s headquarters building in Toyota, Aichi Prefecture (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

Labor authorities have recognized the suicide in 2017 of a Toyota Motor Corp. employee who was continually harassed by his superior as work-related.

The Aichi Labor Bureau's Toyota Labor Standards Inspection Office in Toyota, Aichi Prefecture, approved a claim filed by the 28-year-old man's bereaved family over his death. The decision came on Sept. 11.

"Our son studied hard and loved sports growing up. He was surrounded by many friends, always gave his best and joined Toyota with a lot of hope," the man's parents said in a statement released through a lawyer. "But relentless and violent language from his boss derailed his life, and now he's gone."

The bereaved family is considering demanding compensation from the automaker over the death.

According to lawyer Yoshihide Tachino, who represents the bereaved family, the man joined Toyota in April 2015 after completing a graduate program at the University of Tokyo.

After finishing on-the-job training, he was assigned to a department related to vehicle design in March 2016.

Harassment from his boss started the following month. His superior called him "stupid" and "idiotic" daily, and he was often harshly rebuked.

On one occasion, he was told, "If you can't even explain this, you might as well die."

At another point, the boss called the man into a room and said, "Don't you dare record what I say." He then demanded the man prove he wasn't recording, saying, "Show me your mobile phone."

The man became mentally unstable around June that year and took temporary leave for three months from July. After he returned, he was transferred to a different department, but his desk was on the same floor where his former boss worked.

The man soon started to make errors with simple tasks and operations owing to his mental state. When he felt pressure at work, his hands shook.

"I want to die. I don't have anything to look forward to in the future," the man grumbled to a colleague around July 2017.

Another colleague in August heard the man say, "I might kill myself. I bought a rope."

Around that time he wrote an e-mail to his parents, saying: "This company is garbage. I'd rather die."

In October, the man committed suicide in his room at a company dormitory.

According to Tachino, labor officials tend to assume that a person has fully recovered if he or she no longer continues to go to the hospital after returning to work following time off. As a result, a causal relation between harassment that occurred prior to the leave and subsequent symptoms or incidents, in this case, suicide, often go unrecognized.

Tachino was satisfied with the decision by the Toyota inspection office, saying that it "took account of the actual circumstances and made an appropriate and very significant judgement."

"We desperately hope that (Toyota) makes efforts to improve the work environment and stops power harassment (from occurring)," the family said in the statement.

A Toyota spokesperson said, "We take the inspection office's decision seriously and will make efforts to prevent labor-related incidents and monitor employee health."