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Australian on trial in Tokyo, case hinges on if he said “This is a robbery” or “Go to a door”

Master Blaster Oct 17, 2024
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Possibly the first time a trial in Japan is decided by English grammar and pronunciation.

As a foreigner living in Japan, it can be uncomfortable to have your Japanese language ability, or even your usage of English for that matter, come under scrutiny. So, I can’t even begin to imagine what a 32-year-old Australian national is feeling as his Japanese ability and English pronunciation could mean the difference between freedom and six years in prison.

The incident occurred at about 11:30 pm on 23 June 2023. According to the defendant’s statements, he was doing some parkour on his way home from a night of drinking, jumping off walls and whatnot in a residential area, when he claims to have picked up a faint smell of gasoline.

Noticing a kerosene tank on the second-floor balcony of a nearby house, as well as the light and sound of someone watching TV on the same floor, he says he climbed up there to warn whoever was inside. He found a small shovel on the balcony and picked it up to either knock on the window or pry it open to get the resident’s attention.

The resident, a man in his 70s, noticed the Australian and came out onto the balcony. The older man claims that the Australian had said “This is a robbery!” and “Where is the money?” in Japanese, and a scuffle between the two ensued. The older man was injured in the fight and the Australian fled the scene soon after.

After his arrest, the Australian maintained that he never intended to rob the man and was only trying to save him from a potential fire. As the case went to trial, the defense lawyers asked the Judges if they knew the popular segment from the late-night show Tamori Club called the Soramimi Hour. In these segments clips of English-language songs are played where the lyrics are humorously misheard to sound like Japanese phrases.

▼ In this segment, James Brown singing “bring the juice” is heard by Japanese ears as “ringo (apple) juice” and more.

The lawyer brought this up because he claimed that at its heart this was a case of “soramimi” the Japanese word for mishearing something. In this case the sentence “This is a robbery!” in Japanese is “Goto da!” but according to the defense, what the Australian was actually saying was, “Go to a door!” Moreover, the demanding question of “Where is the money?” in Japanese is “Kin wa doko da?” but this was said to really be “Can you walk?” in English.

Throughout the trial, these sentences would be dissected in an effort to find the truth. The defendant was asked to say “Go to a door” in the courtroom to which the judges felt it didn’t sound that much like “goto da“. Furthermore, the prosecution questioned why the defendant said “Go to a door” rather than “Go to the door” to which the defendant replied that he didn’t know where “the” door was in this house so he was talking about any door to get out of there.

The defense also explained that the defendant had only arrived in Japan in 2022 and didn’t know the Japanese word for “robbery” was “goto“. However, the prosecution was skeptical of that, pointing out that the defendant studied Japanese and has Japanese coworkers.

The trial has come to an end and the judges are expected to deliver a verdict on 18 October. Meanwhile, the court of public opinion online appears to be skewed towards a guilty verdict with many accusing the lawyer of pulling some Better-Call-Saul-style sleazy litigating.

“That’s a stretch!”
“You shouldn’t play games in court.”
“The defense lawyers must have come up with that in a bar.”
“An Australian ‘can’ really doesn’t sound like ‘kin‘. It has a hard ‘a’ sound.”
“That lawyer is earning his money.”
“There should be a law against lawyers like that.”
“So, was there really a gas leak?”
“In Australia, is it normal to climb up to the second floor of a house when people smell gas?”
“It feels strange to me that an Australian would announce his crime like that.”
“He was only armed with a small shovel that he found there. His excuse is not as strange as it sounds.”

Those last two comments raise some valid points. Regardless of whether or not the defendant knew the word “goto” it would still seem odd for him to use it during his crime. I’ve lived here for decades and I still don’t feel enough intimacy with the language where I would shout “Goto da!” if I were to actually rob someone.

There also seems to be a complete lack of a motive for this crime. Despite all the kooky details of this incident, it still seems more plausible that an employed guy, whose life is going smoothly enough that he can indulge in some drinking and parkouring, suddenly deciding to rob a house without even knowing if there is anything of value inside.

Still, I’m not privy to all the details of the case and it will be up to the Tokyo District Court to decide this man’s fate on 18 October.

Source: The Sankei Shimbun, My Game News Flash
Featured image: Pakutaso
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