The Justice Ministry said Friday that a special probe into suspicious prisoner deaths between 1993 and 2002 has found evidence of abuse by guards in just two of the 1,566 cases under scrutiny.

The two cases involve fatal abuse of inmates at Nagoya Prison over the past two years -- cases that came to light in the fall.

It was in the wake of those revelations that the ministry formed a special investigation team of five prosecutors and five ministry officials.