JAPAN: DEATH PENALTY ON MAN CONVICTED OF KILLING 2 TO STAND

Justice Mutsuo Tahara of the Japanese Supreme Court turned down an appeal by Yukiharu Fuchigami, 42, sentenced to death for murder. In May 2003, the Miyazaki District Court sentenced Fuchigami to death, a decision upheld in January 2007 by the Fukuoka High Court's Miyazaki branch. Fuchigami allegedly killed a 47-year-old man in March 1999 in Saito, Miyazaki Prefecture. He was also convicted of conspiring with another person to kill a 47-year-old man six months later in the capital of Miyazaki.