Osaka Court Rules against Scandal-Linked Document Disclosure

Osaka, Sept. 14 (Jiji Press)--Osaka District Court on Thursday rejected a petition to overturn the Finance Ministry’s decision not to disclose documents related to a document-tampering scandal that led to the suicide of a ministry official.

Presiding Judge Atsushi Tokuchi found that the refusal to disclose even the existence of such documents was legal. The ministry had voluntarily submitted to prosecutors administrative documents on the scandal linked to the discount sale of state land to school operator Moritomo Gakuen.

The court dismissed the request by Masako Akagi, 52, the widow of Toshio, a former employee at the ministry’s Kinki Local Finance Bureau who took his own life over the scandal.

The plaintiff plans to appeal the ruling.

Akagi requested in 2021 the disclosure of the administrative documents submitted to prosecutors by the ministry and the Kinki bureau, saying that they contained details of how Toshio’s superior ordered the document-tampering.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]