Presiding Judge Yoshimasa Kawabe of the Tokyo High...

Presiding Judge Yoshimasa Kawabe of the Tokyo High Court affirmed the Tokyo District Court's 1998 death sentence against Kazuaki Okazaki, 41, finding him guilty of killing in 1989 Yokohama lawyer Tsutsumi Sakamoto, 33, his wife Satoko, 29, and their 1-year-old son Tatsuhiko. Sakamoto was at the time leader of a group of lawyers representing families whose relatives joined the AUM cult.
According to the 1998 ruling, AUM founder Shoko Asahara, 46, felt Sakamoto's anti-AUM activities were a threat to the cult and ordered Okazaki and four other senior followers to kill the lawyer.
Besides Asahara, the four others indicted in the crime are Kiyohide Hayakawa, 52, Tomomasa Nakagawa, 39, Tomomitsu Niimi, 37, and Satoru Hashimoto, 34. Of them, Hayakawa and Hashimoto were sentenced to death in July 2000 and appealed to the high court.
The Tokyo District Court has yet to hand down rulings for Asahara, Nakagawa and Niimi.
Okazaki was also found guilty of killing AUM member Shuji Taguchi, then 21, who tried to leave the sect, in Fujinomiya, Shizuoka Prefecture, in February 1989.
The ruling marks the first high court sentence on an AUM member who was sentenced to capital punishment at a lower court.