Courtesy Mainichi Japan

NAGOYA — The Nagoya District Public Prosecutors Office’s decision not to indict 13 officials at a regional immigration bureau, including the bureau chief, over the death of a Sri Lankan woman was unjust, a citizens’ panel reviewing prosecutors’ judgments here announced on Dec. 26.

In response to the Nagoya No. 1 Committee for the Inquest of Prosecution’s ruling dated Dec. 21, the public prosecutors office will reopen its investigation into the death of Wishma Sandamali.

Wishma died while detained at the Nagoya Regional Immigration Services Bureau in March 2021 at age 33. Her family members filed a criminal complaint in November that year against the then bureau chief and other officials on suspicion of murder. The Nagoya prosecutors office in June 2022 decided to drop charges against all 13 people including the immigration bureau staff, saying that the causal relationship between the bureau’s handling of the woman and her death “could not be recognized.”

In August, the family submitted a petition claiming that the immigration officials had failed to provide proper medical care and food to Wishma, resulting in her death. They pointed out that the causal relationship between her death and how the immigration bureau handled her could be well established, and that prosecutors’ non-indictment decision was unreasonable.

(Japanese original by Kenichiro Fuji, Nagoya News Center)