seeking criminal charges

Tokyo ignored calls to issue iodine during crisis

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/analysis/AJ2011102615825

By YURI OIWA / Staff Writer

As the quake-stricken Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant was spewing radiation, the Nuclear Safety Commission of Japan urged the central government to issue iodine tablets to residents in affected areas. But Tokyo apparently ignored the advice. The central government did not issue instructions to municipalities in Fukushima Prefecture to lessen the health risk faced by residents.

Cesium and strontium were among radioactive materials leaked from the plant.

Under existing guidelines, the task force set up in Fukushima to handle the nuclear crisis is supposed to act on advice given by the NSCJ. As such, it was negligent in not issuing directives for iodine tablets to be handed out. Gen Suzuki, a member of an advisory panel at the NSCJ and president of the International University of Health and Welfare, said, "I sent a statement (to the headquarters) a few times saying residents with at least 10,000 cpm of radiation should take iodine tablets."

Later that same day, the crisis headquarters in Fukushima faxed the NSCJ a draft statement to be issued to municipal governments in the prefecture. It made no mention of iodine tablets, the NSCJ said. The NSCJ then repeated its advice to the headquarters in Tokyo.

“I was told to work at the plant like a kamikaze pilot,”

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/behind_news/politics/AJ201212090052

Worker wants new government to secure safety at Fukushima plant

THE ASAHI SHIMBUN December 09, 2012

A TEPCO employee in his 20s who grew up in Fukushima Prefecture has become an opponent of nuclear power after the accident at the Fukushima No. 1 plant.

“I was told to work at the plant like a kamikaze pilot,” said the man, who is evacuating from Fukushima Prefecture due to high levels of radiation he received. “I have no idea about how much radiation I was exposed to.”

He said a large number of his colleagues left the company during the past year.

11 Counts of Manslaughter & Environmental Crimes with more to come

http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2012/11/bp_enters_45_b...

By Mark Schleifstein, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune The Times-Picayune on November 15, 2012 at 8:00 PM, updated November 15, 2012 at 8:17 PM

Under the plea agreement, BP will plead guilty to 11 felony counts of misconduct or neglect of ships' officers relating to the loss of 11 lives (the equivalent of manslaughter charges); one misdemeanor count under the Clean Water Act; one misdemeanor count under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act; and one felony count of obstruction of Congress. The agreement must still be approved by U.S. District Judge Sarah Vance, before whom BP officials appeared on Thursday.

"Thirteen of the 14 criminal charges pertain to the accident itself and are based on the negligent misinterpretation of the negative pressure test conducted on board the Deepwater Horizon," said the BP news release announcing the settlement. The pressure test was aimed at determining whether drilling fluids had enough pressure to block the flow of gas to the surface, which is believed to be the cause of the explosion that killed 11 workers and injured many others.

“Those who fail to exercise due care and thereby cause the death or injury of another face up to five years in prison or a fine of up to ¥1 million.”

Friday, Nov. 16, 2012 http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20121116b4.html

FUKUSHIMA — A criminal complaint was filed by 13,000 people nationwide Thursday against 33 senior officials of Tokyo Electric Power Co. and the government's now-defunct Nuclear Safety Commission over the meltdown disaster at Fukushima.

In the complaint filed with prosecutors, the 13,000 demanded that the accused be investigated and charged with professional negligence resulting in death and injury. According to the Penal Code, those who fail to exercise due care and thereby cause the death or injury of another face up to five years in prison or a fine of up to ¥1 million.

The plaintiffs blame their exposure to radiation on the officials. Their complaint also focuses on people who died, for whatever reason, while working at the stricken nuclear plant, and local residents who committed suicide after being forced to evacuate. Workers dealing with the subsequent meltdown crisis have died, but to date no fatalities have been directly attributed to radiation exposure.

It has been widely reported that Tepco was well aware of the tsunami threat at Fukushima No. 1 but failed to boost the plant's defenses.

TEPCO engineers predicted HUGE Fukushima tsunami

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/13/world/asia/tepco-admits-failure-in-ack...

Japan Power Company Admits Failings on Plant Precautions

By MARTIN FACKLER Published: October 12, 2012

TOKYO — Tokyo Electric Power Company, the operator of Japan’s stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, admitted for the first time on Friday that it had failed to take stronger measures to prevent disasters for fear of inviting lawsuits or protests against its nuclear plants.

The admission, an apparent bid to inspire confidence, also seemed to confirm one of the main arguments of the company’s critics: that it refused to recognize and fix problems because it did not want to jeopardize the so-called safety myth that Japan’s nuclear technology was infallible.

In the report, Tepco said that before the accident it had been afraid to consider the risk of such a large tsunami, fearing admissions of risk could result in public pressure to shut plants down. “There were concerns that if new countermeasures against severe accidents were installed, concern would spread in host communities that the current plants had safety problems,” the report said.

The company has already admitted, however, that even its own engineers had predicted a far larger tsunami was possible in Fukushima, a finding that the company and regulators both chose to ignore or not make public.

The facts are not ‘in dispute’ for Japan.

Ignorance, Arrogance, Collusion, Denial, Danger, Death, Deception, Concealment

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2012/07/panel-slams-tokyo-gove...

http://www.thebulletin.org/web-edition/op-eds/japan%E2%80%99s-culture-cu...

Japan leaders, utility slammed for 'MAN-MADE' nuclear disaster

An independent parliamentary commission accused the Japanese government and the nation's leading utility of "collusion" in avoiding vital nuclear safety improvements that would have prevented the reactor meltdowns last year at the tsunami-damaged Fukushima complex. In its report based on 900 hours of testimony, the Japanese Diet's 10-member investigative panel accused government and industry leaders of having “betrayed the nation's right to be safe from nuclear accidents.”

Japanese nuclear regulators with the Nuclear Industrial and Safety Agency colluded with Fukushima operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. in willfully ignoring necessary safety upgrades, the report stated. “Across the board, the commission found ignorance and arrogance unforgivable for anyone or any organization that deals with nuclear power,” the report said.

I don't believe the Government of Japan made the mere promotion of nuclear power a crime. Therefore, I don't see how people can be charged with a crime merely because they supported nuclear power.

In the wake of Fukushima, we see that Japan had some serious regulatory failures. Japanese regulatory law allowed the backup fuel tanks to be above ground where they could be wiped out by the tsunami, rather than buried as the USA requires.

Japanese law allowed the backup diesel generators and switchgear to be placed in a basement that was vulnerable to flooding. US law requires such equipment to be in water-tight vaults and/or high in the buildings.

TEPCO was in compliance with these deficient regulations; so how can they be charged.

The problem is with the laws written by the Japanese law makers.

However, Japanese law makers, like their US counterparts, EXEMPT themselves from culpability due to deficiencies in the laws.

I don't believe this legal process is going anywhere.