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November 9, 2000
On July 21, 1994, the chief priest of Shinmyo-ji Temple in Muroran City in Hokkaido was fatally injured when his car drifted into the opposing traffic lane and had a head-on collision with a truck.
In its September 1, 1994 issue, the weekly Shukan Shincho claimed that the priest was murdered by the Soka Gakkai, citing that the driver of the truck that collided with the priest’s car was a Soka Gakkai member.
Liberal Democratic Party Diet member, Jiro Kawasaki, referred to this article in a nationally televised Diet debate, causing enormous damage to the reputation of Mr. Nobuyuki Shirayama, the driver of the truck.
Although Mr. Shirayama is indeed a member of the Soka Gakkai, the investigating police and insurance company found that the priest caused the head-on collision. It was ruled that Mr. Shirayama was an innocent victim in the accident.
In response to the publication of blatant falsehoods about him, Mr. Shirayama filed a libel suit against Shinchosha, the publisher of Shukan Shincho. On December 20, 1996, Sapporo District Court ordered the publisher to pay Mr. Shirayama 1.1 million yen in damages.
Shinchosha appealed to the Sapporo High Court, but the appeal was turned down on September 25, 1997. The chief judge stated in the judgment that “the suspicion that the story was from the start intended as an attack on the Soka Gakkai cannot be removed.”
The publisher appealed to the Supreme Court, in a unanimous decision by all judges, the court rejected its appeal on March 26, 1998. The court order for the publisher to pay damages of 1.1 million yen, a relatively high amount for a Japanese court case, was confirmed.
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