Civil servant who handed out JCP paper cleared

Kyodo News
Tuesday, March 30, 2010

A former government agency employee was acquitted Monday of civil service law violations for passing out copies of the Japanese Communist Party newspaper in 2003.

Akio Horikoshi, 56, who worked at the Social Insurance Agency, received a rare suspended fine by the Tokyo District Court in 2006, but Monday's ruling by the Tokyo High Court reversed that decision, saying his actions did not undermine the administrative neutrality of a public servant.

"The defendant's actions were sporadic and unrelated to his work, and it is difficult to recognize that there were risks of hurting the neutrality of administrative management and public trust," said presiding Judge Takao Nakayama, adding it would be an "excessive restriction" of freedom to punish Horikoshi.

Nakayama also made a rare note that the freedom of public servants to engage in political activities has grown and "it is time to re-examine" what actions should be subject to punishment.

Horikoshi was arrested and indicted in March 2004 for distributing extra editions of the Akahata Shimbun in neighbors' mailboxes in October and November 2003, shortly before a Lower House election.

It was the first time a government official was accused of violating Article 102 of the civil service law since the Supreme Court found a postal worker guilty in 1974 of involvement in an election campaign for a Japan Socialist Party candidate.

Article 102 of the law bans civil servants from engaging in political activities.

Horikoshi argued in court that passing out the newspaper was a private action because it was done on a weekend and away from his workplace.

The district court sentenced Horikoshi in June 2006 to a ¥100,000 fine, suspended for two years, after ruling his actions violated the National Civil Service Law but did not immediately undermine the neutrality of a public servant.

"It is my greatest joy that the judge recognized my actions did not constitute a crime at all," Horikoshi said after the high court ruling.

Saying he was relieved to hear the decision, he added, "Although Japan has been left behind in the field of democracy, I think Japanese history changed" with the ruling.

The ruling was welcomed by Horikoshi's supporters and others related to the JCP.

"Looking at it from the standpoint of freedom of expression ensured under the Constitution, it is a righteous ruling," said Tadayoshi Ichida, secretary general of the JCP, adding the prosecutors should not appeal.

Horikoshi lost his public servant status after he was employed at the Japan Pension Service, which in January succeeded the Social Insurance Agency.