‘This is the beginning’: 91-year-old sister of longest death row inmate sees hope in his acquittal

Associated Press

HAMAMATSU, Japan (AP) — After helping lead the fight to free her younger brother from nearly a half-century on death row, Hideko Hakamada feels she and her brother are beginning a new chapter of their lives. Her brother, Iwao Hakamada, is the world’s longest-serving death row inmate. She backed him through decades of frustrating, at times apparently hopeless, legal wrangling as his mental condition worsened. He became only the fifth death row inmate to be acquitted in a retrial in postwar Japan, where prosecutors have near-perfect conviction rates and retrials are extremely rare. Now 91 years old, Hideko Hakamada said in an interview with The Associated Press that she wants that changed, based on the lessons learned from her brother’s case.