Quest for Justice Turns Spotlight on Japanese School Bullying

They were on the train home after a trip to the aquarium when Midori Komori’s 15-year-old daughter first told her about the harassment.

Music class was particularly tough, Kasumi said, crying. Some of the girls made fun of a rash on her skin. They called her mobile phone after school to continue the insults. It had been going on for months.

Three weeks later it stopped. Midori Komori found Kasumi in a bathroom at home, hanging from a rope.

That was nearly three years ago, but the Komoris’ ordeal continues. Despite an intense effort, the Komoris still don’t know what led their daughter to kill herself. No one has been punished. Perhaps no one ever will be.

But their battle may not have been in vain.

Like few cases before it, Kasumi’s death and her parents’ effort to find answers caught this nation’s attention, symbolizing for many the deep-rooted problem of bullying in Japan’s schools and the difficulties bullying victims have in finding justice.

The public’s right to know is still a novel idea in Japan. Information disclosure laws exist, but the arduous process of obtaining documents dissuades most people from using them.

Still, a slew of scandals involving corruption or negligence in the government and public institutions--including schools--has generated calls for increased accountability and transparency.

Widespread media coverage of Kasumi’s death and her parents’ campaign to find answers has drawn Noba High School into that debate.

The whitewashed, four-story public school in a quiet suburban Yokohama neighborhood is known for its nationally ranked music program, which attracts promising young musicians from towns several hours away.

Kasumi, who played the trombone, was one of those who chose the school for its music classes. According to the Komoris, that was where her problems began. Beyond that there is little agreement.

The school acknowledges bullying may have occurred, but denies the harassment was the cause of Kasumi’s death.

“There may have been some friction between students, but from our perspective bullying was not the issue,” said Katsuhiko Takano, Noba’s headmaster.

That is a familiar response.

Every year in Japan, dozens of elementary, junior high and high school students kill themselves out of desperation or commit crimes of revenge upon their tormentors.

But pinning down the extent of the problem--or the exact reasons why a child chose suicide--is notoriously difficult.

In 1999, 163 students in public schools committed suicide, according to Education Ministry figures. Officially, none was caused by bullying, and the ministry says it has seen a recent decline in the number of bullying incidents.

No one expects bullying to go away, however.

Experts say bullying is an endemic problem, fanned by the highly competitive nature of Japan’s educational system, the intense pressure on schoolchildren to conform and a lack of intervention from teachers and school officials.

Susumu Abe, an educator who has written extensively about Japan’s schools, sees a larger problem behind bullying. Juvenile delinquency and teen prostitution are increasing, he said. And schools are finding themselves ill equipped to deal with rising absenteeism and violence.

“There’s been a breakdown in values among Japan’s teenagers,” he said. “Teens don’t care that their behavior affects people around them, and it shows in how they treat others. And adults don’t think it’s enough of a problem to do something about it.”

Yuichiro Morita, who works in the Education Ministry’s junior high education unit, says the ministry has zero-tolerance guidelines for bullying. But he concedes enforcement is left to schools and local education boards.

The legal system, meanwhile, has offered little recourse to victims or their families.

It was not until January that a Japanese court ruled against the government and, by extension, a school in a bullying case. The Yokohama court ordered nine former junior high students and the local government to pay $350,000 in damages to a couple whose son killed himself after being taunted at a public school.

The Komoris say all they wanted to know after their daughter’s suicide was why Kasumi had problems adjusting to high school. They told school officials that they would not sue, hoping teachers would be more cooperative.

At first it seemed to work.

In two letters, dated August and September 1998, the school compiled conversations that teachers recalled having with Kasumi about her troubles.

School officials balked, however, when the Komoris pressed to have Kasumi’s tormentors reprimanded.

“They told us they had no plans to conduct an investigation and that no students would be punished,” Kasumi’s father, Shinichiro, said.

The Komoris then focused their efforts elsewhere.

They met with officials of the Yokohama Youth Counseling Center, where Kasumi had seen a counselor for several months. They were told confidentiality rules strictly prohibited anyone--even family--from seeing records.

So the Komoris took their case to the Education Ministry.

“We were told to talk to a regional board of education, which eventually referred us back to the school,” said Shinichiro Komori.

In October 1998 the Komoris took their case before a panel of human rights lawyers.

The lawyers agreed to interview teachers and students who knew Kasumi. But they warned the Komoris that even if their investigation found the school had been negligent, the ruling would not automatically lead to criminal charges.

Two years passed.

Tired of waiting, the Komoris renewed their request to see the counseling center’s records. Within weeks, a package from the center arrived containing eight pages of the counselor’s notes--all but the first six lines blacked out.

“The officials at the center told us they were following the rules,” Shinichiro Komori said.

The parents went back, and the center finally gave in. On Jan. 9 the Komoris received a lengthy report detailing Kasumi’s fragile psychological state and her reluctance to confide in her parents.

The Komoris also recently got a ruling from the human rights panel, which ruled Noba High was negligent, warned school officials and ordered the school to protect bullied students.

But although it found that “pressure” and “isolation” contributed to Kasumi’s suicide, the panel stopped short of saying the one thing the Komoris had hoped it would--that Kasumi was bullied.

“The panel avoided the real issue,” her father said.