Tokyo Proceedings to Begin Jan. 14 : Lawyer Protests Separate Trials in L.A. Slaying Case

The chief defense counsel for Kazuyoshi Miura, a Japanese businessman accused of attempting to murder his wife in Los Angeles four years ago, Wednesday lashed out at the prosecution and the court for holding a separate trial for his former mistress, who has pleaded guilty in the case.

Calling the account given by Michiko Yazawa, a 25-year-old waitress, a “fabrication,” the attorney, Futaba Igarashi said, “Though neither Yazawa’s lawyer nor the prosecution is required to summon Miura as a witness in Yazawa’s trial, they are not giving Miura a chance to speak.”

Yazawa claimed that Miura paid her $2,500 to fly to Los Angles and attack his wife Kazumi in a room at the New Otani Hotel on Aug. 13, 1981.

Miura is scheduled to be tried on charges of attempted murder on Jan. 14. “Were the two to be tried together, Yazawa’s story would fall apart,” Igarashi said in an interview.

Three months after the alleged attempt, Mrs. Miura suffered a head wound in a Los Angeles parking lot during what her husband described as a robbery attempt. She fell into a coma from which she never recovered.

Shortly after charges were brought against Miura in Japan, he was named by Los Angeles Dist. Atty. Ira Reiner as the sole suspect in the slaying of his wife and Chizuko Shiraishi, a former woman friend of Miura whose remains were identified in a Los Angeles morgue last year. She had been missing since 1979.

At a court hearing Wednesday, prosecutors asked for a three-year prison sentence for Yazawa, the longest sentence that judges can commute to immediate parole. Sentencing is scheduled to take place Jan. 8.

While Miura has admitted benefiting financially from the deaths of the two women, he has denied any involvement in their violent deaths.

Yazawa, who had a minor role in a soft-core porno film two years ago, confessed to having hit Mrs. Miura on the back of the head with a hammer-like instrument, but has pleaded throughout her trial that she was in love with Miura and therefore under his influence.

“Miura took advantage of Yazawa’s love for him and used her like a convenient tool,” her defense counsel, Kurayoshi Harayama, told the court.

Miura and Yazawa, who were arrested in Japan three months ago, were charged under a rarely invoked law which makes Japanese citizens liable for crimes committed overseas.

Appeals by Igarashi to have the two trials combined were turned down by the court twice. Igarashi said the court did not give any reason for rejecting her appeals.

“Japanese courts are easily influenced by popular sentiment, so if Yazawa is found guilty, Miura will have to be found guilty too,” the attorney said.

An official of the Japanese prosecutors office, however, declared that the two trials were being conducted separately to protect Yazawa’s human rights.

“Her trial will be over quickly so she should not be kept waiting to serve her sentence while Miura is pleading innocent,” said the official, who requested anonymity.

Wednesday’s hearing received wide media coverage in Japan, where the Miura case is popularly known as the “Los Angeles Suspicion.”

The free-wheeling coverage of Miura’s turbulent personal life has become the subject of controversy, with opinion divided among those who justify journalistic prying by stressing the probablity of Miura’s guilt, and those who argue that prying reporting can make anyone appear guilty.