Photo/Illutration A police officer tries to subdue Tetsuya Yamagami after former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was fatally shot in Nara on July 8, 2022. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

The defense team of Tetsuya Yamagami, who is accused of murdering former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, is expected to contend that the crime stemmed from “religious abuse” in his family and was not an act of political terrorism, sources said.

The criminal trial for Yamagami, 45, is scheduled to begin at Nara District Court in October.

Yamagami’s lawyers will likely assert that the motive was resentment over the financial hardship caused by his mother’s donations to the Unification Church, now formally called the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification. 

On the other side, prosecutors will argue that the focus should be on the malicious nature of the crime, saying that delving into the influence of the religious group is inappropriate.

The central debate in the trial is likely to be how the court interprets the relationship between Yamagami’s upbringing and the crime.

According to sources, Yamagami's mother joined the Unification Church when he was in elementary school.

She donated around 100 million yen ($674,916) by using money from her husband’s life insurance and by selling their home.

Even after she filed for personal bankruptcy, she continued following her faith. As a result, Yamagami had to give up on his hopes of entering a university.

Although half the money his mother contributed to the Unification Church was returned at the request of his relatives, Yamagami reportedly told police that, “Our life was ruined by the donation. I have held a resentment against the religious group and targeted Abe, who had close ties with the group.”

RELIGIOUS SCHOLAR POINTS TO ‘NEGLECT’

The defense lawyers believe that Yamagami’s background should be appropriately considered in the sentencing phase. So, they asked a religious scholar to analyze his upbringing through interviews with him.

The scholar concluded that the case falls into “neglect,” one of the four types of child abuse related to religious beliefs as defined by the health ministry. The mother had donated so much that there was no money left for education and even traveled to South Korea for religious activities, leaving her children at home.

Based on this analysis, the defense team plans to argue in court that Yamagami's grudge against the religious group stemmed from "religious abuse" by his mother.

They also plan to further assert that Yamagami targeted Abe because of his deep connections with the church, including sending congratulatory telegrams and video messages.

The team will likely emphasize that the crime originated from Yamagami’s personal grudge and that he didn’t have any political motive. The team has asked to call five witnesses to the stand in court, including the scholar, Yamagami’s mother and his sister.


PROSECUTORS WILL FOCUS ON 'MALICIOUS NATURE’

Meanwhile, the prosecution has been asserting during the pre-trial procedures that the principle of criminal trials is to focus on the malicious nature of the crime, instead of the defendants’ background.

The prosecution aims to prove the high lethality of the homemade shotgun used to shoot Abe and the danger to the surrounding crowd when it was fired.

To do this, they have requested testimony from experts who examined the weapon and the police officers involved in the investigation.

The first hearing in the trial is scheduled for Oct. 28. The court is expected to soon decide which witnesses will be allowed to testify.

Yamagami was arrested on the spot on July 8, 2022, in front of Kintetsu Railway Co.’s Yamato-Saidaiji Station in Nara following the fatal shooting of Abe, who was giving a campaign speech in support of an Upper House election candidate.

He has been indicted for murder and violations of the Law to Control the Possession of Firearms and Swords.

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