Cap: Masako Akagi tearfully reports her frustration at a press conference held after she was informed that her lawsuit had come to a sudden end, in Osaka, on Dec. 15, 2021. (Mainichi/Yumi Shibamura)

       OSAKA -- The Japanese government's about-face to accept liability for damages and quickly end a lawsuit filed by the wife of a Finance Ministry employee who killed himself after being forced to doctor official documents has blindsided the woman and angered her, as she fears the move may prevent her from finding out about the circumstances leading to her husband's death.

       The lawsuit was brought to the Osaka District Court by Masako Akagi, the wife of Toshio Akagi, who was forced to illicitly alter documents over the heavily discounted sale of state-owned land to nationalist school operator Moritomo Gakuen. Her husband took his own life at the age of 54.

       The suit was brought to a sudden end on Dec. 15 when the government accepted liability for damages demanded by Masako Akagi. Soon after closed-door consultations on court proceedings at the district court began at 2 p.m., a legal representative for the Japanese government stood up and told Akagi, the judge and others present that the government acknowledged the plaintiff's claims, and that it would wholly accept the plaintiff's demand for compensation.

       Having been told about the government's move at the Osaka District Court, Akagi, who had continued to seek the truth behind her husband's death, told reporters, with eyes red from crying, "It came out of left field and was underhanded." Her attorney added, "It is a move that puts a lid on the truth."

       The closed-door session was intended to be about sorting through the claims of both sides and had not entailed prior comparison of notes. The move to fully accept compensation liability was an abrupt change in direction on the government's part. Akagi's attorney immediately objected to the move, saying that it was "insincere and in violation of the principle of good faith and fair dealing." Akagi said, "Are you trying to kill my husband again?" But the government's offer to pay for damages in full and end the lawsuit was accepted by the court.

       Until now, the government had taken the position of fighting the lawsuit, denying there was a causal relationship between Toshio Akagi's death and the document tampering he was forced to carry out. However, the paperwork that was submitted by the government's legal representative on this day recognized a causal relationship for the first time, saying, "It is fair to acknowledge responsibility for Mr. Akagi developing psychiatric problems that led to his death, after he was swamped with various assignments including responses to the order to doctor official documents, which he was strongly opposed to doing."

       Masako Akagi, who spoke at a press conference in Osaka after the session at the district court, said through tears, "I thought, stop messing around. I've been fighting for a long time, and it feels like I just suffered a devastating defeat." She had been trying, through the lawsuit, to get to the bottom of the cause and the process through which her beloved husband had been driven to kill himself. She stressed, "It's not an issue that can be settled through money. I wanted to know why my husband had to die. That was what the lawsuit was for."

       Ever since Akagi filed the lawsuit against the government in March 2020, she had been at the mercy of the successive administrations of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and their insincere handling of the case. For more than a year, the government did not even admit the existence of meticulous notes left by Toshio Akagi about the document tampering over the discounted sale of state land, known as the "Akagi file," until a court ordered it to submit them.

       Akagi sent a letter to newly appointed Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, saying, "I request that an investigation be conducted into how the Finance Ministry responded to my husband doing the right thing." She had said that she had a feeling that Prime Minister Kishida would be willing to listen to her.

       Akagi was nevertheless pushed away once again, just as she held hopes that an investigation to get to the bottom of her husband's death would be carried out. The reason that she filed for such a high amount -- over 100 million yen (approx. $876,000) -- in damages was to prevent the government from submitting a cognovit note, and still, the government chose to end the lawsuit. "I'm so frustrated that the government ended the lawsuit in the most underhanded way," Akagi said. "What am I supposed to report back to my husband?"

       Tadashi Matsumaru, Akagi's attorney, said, "The government surely knew full well what the purpose of the lawsuit was, and had a duty to explain what happened to the public in an open trial. I can only think that as facts emerged, they accepted the plaintiff's demands to put a lid on inconvenient truths."

       A senior Finance Ministry official said, "(Mrs. Akagi's) detailed claims were made clear in October, and the court had urged us to indicate a specific policy in dealing with the case. We arrived at this conclusion after repeated deliberation ahead of the closed-door consultation."

       (Japanese original by Shiho Matsumoto and Yumi Shibamura, Osaka City News Department)

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