Japan Imprisons Woman for Murder Attempt in L.A.

Michiko Yazawa, 25-year-old former mistress of Tokyo businessman Kazuyoshi Miura, was sentenced today to 2 1/2 years in prison for the attempted murder of Miura’s third wife, Kazumi, in a Los Angeles hotel.

Miura is the central figure in what has come to be known in Japan as the “Los Angeles Suspicion” case. His wife died of head wounds suffered during what her husband has described as a holdup in Los Angeles about three months after the attempt on her life by Yazawa.

In sentencing Yazawa, Tokyo district court Judge Yoshio Shibata rejected Yazawa’s contention that she had no intent to kill Kazumi Miura when she attacked her in a room of the New Otani Hotel in downtown Los Angeles with a hammer-like instrument. Yazawa maintained that the weapon, as well as funds for her trip to Los Angeles, had been provided by Miura.

Shibata also refused to accept Yazawa’s defense that she was not interested in sharing in the equivalent of $480,000 in insurance payments on a policy Miura had taken out on his wife.

Shibata told Yazawa--a former waitress who once acted in a soft-core porno movie--that her crime was “evil and self-centered” and that he had no choice but to send her to prison. Yazawa’s full confession and her repeated statements of repentance in court had prompted speculation that she would be let off with a suspended sentence, common in Japan for first offenders.

Miura is scheduled to be tried on the same charge as Yazawa, that of attempted murder, on Jan. 14. Miura and Yazawa, who were arrested in Japan three months ago, were charged under a rarely invoked law that makes Japanese citizens liable for crimes committed overseas.