Tokyo - The Tokyo High Court yesterday upheld the death sentence against a founding member of the Aum Supreme Truth cult for the murder of four people. "This was a cruel, brutal crime that crushed under foot the idea of a society based on laws," Judge Yoshimasa Kawabe said, rejecting an appeal by lawyers for Kazuaki Okazaki (41).
The death sentence meted out to Okazaki three years ago was the first for a member of the Aum doomsday cult, which released Nazi-invented Sarin gas in Tokyo's subway in March 1995, killing 12 people and injuring thousands.