JAPAN: CABINET OFFICE POLL, 80% OF RESPONDENTS THINK DEATH PENALTY ‘PERMISSIBLE’

January 24, 2015: The Government of Japan released an opinion poll showing 80.3 percent of respondents considered the death penalty a “permissible” sanction, and just 9.7 percent of them felt it should be abolished.
The rate remained high, apparently reflecting respondents’ views that the feelings of crime victims and their relatives should be taken into account, and that serious offenders should receive the harshest punishment, the Cabinet Office poll, conducted every five years, indicated.
The proportion of respondents who felt the death penalty is permissible stood at 85.6 percent in the previous poll conducted in 2009, and at 81.4 percent in the 2004 poll.
In the latest poll, conducted on 3,000 adults under an interview format from 13 November to 23, respondents were asked whether they thought the death penalty was “permissible.” In the previous polls, participants were asked whether they thought capital punishment was “permissible in some cases” only.
When asked to cite their reasons, and with multiple answers allowed, 53.4 percent of those who deemed capital punishment permissible said the victims’ anger could never ease if the system was abolished and offenders were allowed to live. Another 52.9 percent replied that perpetrators of heinous crimes should pay with their life.
Among those opposed to the death penalty, 46.6 percent cited potential miscarriages of justice and 41.6 percent said offenders should be kept alive to atone for their crimes.
Respondents in the latest poll were for the first time asked whether they would support the abolition of capital punishment if Japan introduced a sentence of life imprisonment without parole. The rate of those in favour came to 51.5 percent, against 37.7 percent who still wished to retain the death penalty. (Sources: japantimes.co.jp, 24/01/2015)