Tokyo Subway CW Plotter Diagnosed Unfit for Trial

Aum Shinrikyo cult leader Shoko Asahara is not mentally competent to continue an appeal of his murder conviction, according to a psychiatric evaluation released yesterday by his defense team (see GSN, Nov. 30, 2005).

Attorneys for Asahara, who was sentenced to death for his role in the 1995 sarin attack on the Tokyo subway system, said they would request a suspension of the trial.

“If competency to stand trial is defined as understanding the meaning of the trial and the ability to defend oneself, then (Asahara) should be deemed lacking in such competency,” the report says.

Three of the four psychiatrists who evaluated Asahara found him not competent to stand trial, Kyodo News reported, while the fourth is drafting an independent report on his finding that Asahara’s mental disorder is the result of an extended prison stay. The report recommends that Asahara receive psychological treatment and that the trial be suspended for about six months.

The Tokyo High Court, meanwhile, is commissioning its own psychiatric examination of Asahara, which could be finished next month (Kyodo News/Japan Times, Jan. 16).

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