A Tokyo District Court ruled that the Tokyo Detention...

A Tokyo District Court ruled that the Tokyo Detention House must allow Toshiaki Masunaga, 54, a death-row inmate, to purchase a book even though he had exceeded his allowed limit of possessions. Masunaga, a member of a leftist radical group who was sentenced to death in 1987 for committing acts of terrorism, applied to the detention house to purchase a book in 1998. But the detention house rejected his request as the Justice Ministry has since 1997 limited the possessions of each death-row inmate to an amount equivalent to 120 percent of a 46-liter box. The court ruled in favour of Masunaga, saying he needed many books to maintain his peace of mind.