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Monday March 26, 11:30 AMWoman gets 14-yr prison term for starving boy nearly to death(Kyodo) _ The Osaka District Court sentenced a 41-year-old woman to 14 years in prison Monday for abusing and starving the oldest son of her live-in boyfriend nearly to death, together with the boyfriend, in 2003.Presiding Judge Masahiro Hosoi at the district court's Sakai Branch said in handing down the ruling to Natsuyo Kawaguchi, "The physical pain the boy was suffering is unimaginable. We cannot recognize anything humane in the defendant." The abuse case involving the couple prompted lawmakers to revise the anti-child abuse law to oblige people to notify authorities of a suspected child abuse case even without hard evidence. The boyfriend, Yasunobu Karasuno, 43, is serving a 14-year prison sentence. According to the ruling, the couple started to abuse Karasuno's son, then a junior high school student, in around June 2002, beating and giving him few meals at their home in Kishiwada, Osaka Prefecture. As a result, the boy became so weak that he could no longer eat by himself by around September 2003, a deed construed as attempted murder by prosecutors. Defense lawyers for Kawaguchi had sought a lenient sentence, arguing she had no intention to kill the boy and that she was in diminished capacity at that time. The health condition of the boy, now 18, has improved since he was hospitalized on the verge of death in November 2003. But problems in his brain and limbs are expected to remain, the prosecutors had told the court, demanding a prison sentence of 15 years. |
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