She Searched for “Perfect Crime.” A Japanese Court Found Her Not Guilty of Murder

Sudo Saki found not guilty
Sudo Saki stood accused of murdering her husband - a notorious playboy who went by the flamboyant nickname "the Don Juan of Kishu." This week, Sudo became one of the 0.1% of criminal defendants in Japan who win their cases. Here's how the prosecution's flimsy case fell flat.

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Japanese prosecutors have an impressive – some would say unrealistic and unjust – 99.9% conviction rate. If they take a case to trial, it’s because they have a high degree of certainty they’re gonna win.

In 2018, 77-year-old industrialist Nozaki Kosuke (野崎幸助) died in Tonabe, Wakayama Prefecture from what police determined was an overdose of amphetamines. The primary suspect: His wife/sugar baby, Sudo Saki (須藤早貴), who at the time was 22 years old – 55 years his junior.

Prosecutors thought they had their woman. But this week, Sudo became part of that rare 0.1% of Japanese defendants who are found not guilty. It was a shaky case from the start – and as the trial proceeded, it only got worse for the prosecution.

The murder of the “Don Juan of Kishu”

Sudo Saki and Nozaki Kosuke
Sudo Saki and Nozaki Kosuke.

Nozaki was born in Tanobe in 1941, during World War II. His work as a door-to-door salesman selling condoms – a rarely-used product in Japan in his time – earned him a fortune, as well as his nickname: The Don Juan of Kishu (紀州のドンファン), after a name (Kishu) for the Wakayama/Mie Prefectural area.

Nozaki lived up to the “Don Juan” title. He bragged that he had given over 3 billion yen (USD $19M) to over 4,000 women. When one model stole 60 million yen ($392K) from him from his hotel room, he reportedly replied, “60 million yen is scrap paper to me. It was a good time, in spite of the robbery.”

On February 8th, 2018, he married Sudo Saki. Sudo described herself to Nozaki as a “fashion model.” In reality, most of her jobs until then had been working in cabaret clubs, high-end date clubs, and in Japan’s “Delivery Health” (デリヘル, deri-heru) business, in which workers meet clients for sexual play in their hotel rooms.

Tabloids described Sudo and Nozaki’s marriage as a “loveless” financial relationship. Sudo reportedly got a one million yen a month (USD $6,542) stipend from Nozaki and continuously refused her husband’s sexual advances.

At the time, Nozaki wrote about his marriage to Sudo in an article for Gendai Media. After a chance meeting at the airport where Sudo helped him up after a fall, he says he began dating her. “Would you be my final woman?” he reportedly asked her.

Their marriage date was a butsumetsu (仏滅) day – the unluckiest day for special occasions according to Japan’s rokuyō lunar calendar. Nozaki wrote that he wasn’t bothered by this.

Perhaps he should have been. On May 24th, at 10:30pm, Sudo and a maid found Nozaki collapsed in his bedroom and called the 119 emergency hotline.

Nozaki died shortly thereafter. Medical examiners found what they described as a large amount of amphetamines in his blood and stomach.

Three years until Sudo’s arrest

Police suspected Sudo, who was alone with Nozaki for hours that day, of killing her husband. However, they had a tough time stringing together a case.

The big problem was they had no idea how Nozaki ingested the stimulants or where they came from. Based on plans he’d made, they dismissed the idea that the ancient ladies’ man had committed suicide. But they also couldn’t find any traces of drugs in anything he’d ingested.

It took almost three years for police to arrest Sudo Saki on charges of murder and illegal possession of narcotics. Reports say that police only made an arrest after feeling pressured when one of their internal reports leaked to the press.

Many local reporters in Wakayama worried that police might be barking up the wrong tree and prosecuting an innocent woman. There were also reports that police left the crime scene unsecured on arrival, which would have tainted any evidence they found.

The evidence

Beyond that, police basically had two arguments against Sudo. The first was that they didn’t have any other suspects. Kind of a crappy argument, but let’s go with it.

The other – and more damning – argument was her Internet search history. Sudo had supposedly looked up 覚醒剤脂肪 (kakuseizai shibou; amphetamine death), 完全犯罪 (kanzen hanzai, perfect crime), and 遺産相続 (isan souzoku, inheritance) prior to Nozaki’s death.

Prosecutors also called a former employee who testified that Nozaki was on the verge of divorcing Sudo. The reason: he’d apparently found out about her past starring in AV, or Adult Videos. Apparently, for a man who’d bragged about giving 4,000 women money in exchange for sex, this was somehow Crossing a Line.

The employee further testified that Sudo would get next to nothing if Nozaki divorced her. Sudo staged Nozaki’s death to look like a drug overdose, prosecutors alleged, so she could get his inheritance.

In court, Sudo steadfastly denied the charges. In testimony on November 8th, she said her husband asked her to buy amphetamines for him in April 2018. After searching the Internet, she ended up buying some from someone on the street. However, she claims, Nozaki grew angry with her when the drugs turned out to be fake. She says the two never spoke about amphetamines again.

Prosecutor’s attempt to nail her on the drug sale fell apart in court when one of its witnesses backed up Sudo’s claim that she’d been sold sugar crystals instead of amphetamines.

She and her defense also argued that Nozaki was distraught about the death of his precious dog, Eve, on May 6th, 2018. Sudo says Nozaki “grew strange” after the pet’s death.

Her lawyers concluded the case by imploring the judges to remember that the prosecution hadn’t produced any physical evidence to show that Sudo had forced her husband to take a lethal amount of drugs.

The verdict

Gavel in court

The judge, in the end, agreed with Sudo’s lawyers.

The chief judge delivered the verdict on December 12th. Sudo’s attempt to purchase drugs, they said, was certainly suspicious. And it’s possible she killed her husband. She had, the court recognized, both motive and opportunity.

But it was also possible, based on the evidence, that Nozaki accidentally took a lethal amount of amphetamines on his own. There just wasn’t enough evidence to convict Sudo of murder.

“紀州のドン・ファン”元妻に無罪判決「合理的な疑い残る」

「紀州のドン・ファン」の元妻に無罪判決です。2018年に「紀州のドン・ファン」と呼ばれた和歌山県の資産家、野崎幸助さんに覚醒剤を摂取させて殺害したとして殺人などの罪に問われた元妻の須藤早貴被告に対し、和歌山地裁は12日、無罪の判決を言い渡しました。判決で和歌山地裁は、「野崎さんが誤って覚醒剤を過剰摂取していないとは言い切れない。被告が殺害したとするには合理的な疑いが残る」としました。また、「…

A local news report on the verdict.

Sudo reportedly broke down crying as the judge read the verdict.

Some still vociferously argue that Sudo must’ve done it. Most commentators seem to agree, though, that there wasn’t enough there to convincingly find Nozaki’s ex-wife guilty.

This doesn’t mean that Sudo is a free woman. A Wakayama court found her guilty in a separate case in September of tricking a man out of 29.8 million yen, handing down a three year and six month prison sentence.

As for the Don Juan of Kishu’s fortune, Sudo isn’t getting that either. The city of Tonabe is arguing that it’s owed Nozaki’s entire 1.5 billion yen (USD $9.7M) fortune based on a handwritten will Nozaki left behind. Nozaki’s brothers are disputing the city’s claims, saying the note’s a fake. In June, a court in Wakayama sided with the city.

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