FUKUOKA, March 9 (AP) - (Kyodo)— Prosecutors on Friday appealed to the Supreme Court over a recent high court ruling that upheld a sentence of life imprisonment for a Chinese man who was 19 when he killed two people and injured another in robberies in 2001 and 2002, demanding that he be given the death penalty. The Fukuoka High Public Prosecutors Office said the Feb. 26 ruling by the Fukuoka High Court, which upheld the Oita District Court verdict sentencing the man, now 24, to life in prison, was based on some errors.
Noting two people had been killed, Shinji Takai, deputy head of the prosecutors' office, said, "Even if we take into account the fact that he was a minor at the time of the crimes, he should still be sentenced to death."
On Friday, the prosecutors also appealed the Fukuoka High Court ruling that sentenced a conspirator, Kim Min Su, a 31-year-old South Korean, to 15 years in prison. The ruling reduced the earlier sentence of life imprisonment. Kim appealed the ruling to the Supreme Court himself the same day.
In the Feb. 26 ruling, the Fukuoka High Court said the court took into account the possibility of the Chinese defendant's reformation in giving a life sentence instead of the death penalty as sought by the prosecutors.
The Chinese man was convicted of conspiring with Kim and three other foreign students at Beppu University to steal cash cards from a man and fatally stab him while seriously injuring his wife at their home in Kitsuki, Oita Prefecture, in January 2002.
The man was also convicted of stabbing to death a 35-year-old woman sent from a sex parlor at a hotel in Osaka and robbing her of cash cards in December 2001.
The man's name has been withheld as he was a minor when the crimes were committed.
