The Nagasaki District Court sentenced a woman and her...

The Nagasaki District Court sentenced a woman and her lover to death for killing her husband and son in 1992 and 1998 in order to obtain life insurance money.
According to the ruling handed down by presiding Judge Keizo Yamamoto, former insurance saleswoman Reiko Yamaguchi, 44, and antiques dealer Kazuo Hokao, 55, drowned Katsuhiko Yamaguchi, 38, after pushing him off a quay in the town of Tara, Saga Prefecture, on September 11, 1992. The pair had mixed sleeping pills into his curry meal.
The pair also drowned Yamaguchi's 16-year-old son Yoshinori in the town of Konagai, Nagasaki Prefecture, on October 27, 1998 after the boy was given sleeping pills in a drink, according to the ruling. Lawyers for both are expected to appeal the judgment.
The defendants, residents of Kashima, Saga Prefecture, received some 100 million yen in insurance money by falsely declaring Yamaguchi's husband had died in a fishing accident, the ruling said.
They also attempted to claim an insurance payment of 35 million yen in the boy's death, but doubts to the couple's explanation that the boy died in an accident prompted police investigations.
The two pleaded guilty, but blamed each other for taking the lead in the crimes. Public prosecutors demanded death sentences for both in July 2002.
The judge said Yamaguchi's responsibility was graver than Hokao's but stressed the roles of both were indispensable in executing the crimes. During the trial, Yamaguchi said she acted in retaliation for her husband's unfaithfulness, and said she thought she could split with Hokao if she agreed to the plot to kill her son.
Yamaguchi said Hokao was a gambler and behaved violently. She also said he proposed murdering Yoshinori, and although she initially refused, she finally agreed because she was in financial trouble.
Yamaguchi's lawyers said the ruling was too severe, and said they would appeal. They pleaded clemency in consideration of her remaining son, 22, and daughter, 14.
Hokao, meanwhile, claimed Yamaguchi took the lead in her husband's murder, and they bore the same responsibility in killing Yoshinori.