Photo/Illutration A courtroom sketch shows Yudai Funato during his trial hearing at the Tokyo District Court on Oct. 1. (The Asahi Shimbun)

Prosecutors in the high-profile case of a 5-year-old girl who died after months of physical abuse and neglect are seeking an unprecedentedly long jail term for her stepfather following his admission of guilt.

Legal proceedings before lay judges at the Tokyo District Court wound up Oct. 7 with prosecutors calling for an 18-year prison sentence for Yudai Funato, 34, over the death of his daughter Yua on March 2, 2018, in the capital's Meguro Ward.

“The accused inflicted extreme suffering through starvation of his daughter for more than a month and bullied her until the very end. The level of heinousness is unparalleled,” the prosecution team said in their closing statement.

Defense lawyers argued that a 9-year term was reasonable punishment for their client on grounds “this case doesn’t fall into the most severe category of abuse cases.”

His voice shaking with emotion, Funato in his final statement said: “I am really really sorry. I truly apologize.”

The court will deliver its judgment on Oct. 15.

The call for a long prison term reflects the gravity that prosecutors attached to the case and the fact that Yua was abused over a long period.

In their closing arguments, prosecutors said Funato put Yua on a near-starvation diet from around January 2018. After she became frail and repeatedly vomited in late February, Funato realized that his stepdaughter’s life was in danger. But he did not take her to a hospital and she died on March 2.

Prosecutors also said that Funato lectured Yua’s mother Yuri, 27, in a scolding manner on a daily basis and made her complicit in the abuse. As a result, Yua was cornered and had nowhere to go to for help.

“Funato pushed Yua into a situation where despair was the only thing she had,” prosecutors said.

Defense lawyers argued that while Funato's abuse was in no way justifiable, they contended that their client only realized his daughter’s life was in danger on the day before her death.

“He didn’t neglect her completely until the very end. He fed her when he realized she had vomited, and also called for an ambulance,” the defense team said.

In an assessment of culpability in crimes provided by the Supreme Court for lay judges, 35 similar child abuse cases are mentioned, the defense said.

The most severe ruling handed down to date in such cases concerned a mother and her common-law husband in Sayama, Saitama Prefecture. The mother put her 3-year-old daughter on a near-starvation diet while physical abuse was inflicted continuously. They poured icy cold water on the child and left her naked in the bathroom on a winter's night in 2016, and she died the following day from septicemia.

Prosecutors in the case demanded 13 years in prison for each of them. The Saitama District Court in 2017 handed a 13-year imprisonment to the mother and a term of 12 years and six months for the man.

(This article was written by Shunsuke Abe and Eri Niiya.)