After a juvenile received a life sentence in 2000 for the murder and attempted rape of Yayoi Motomura, 23, and the murder of her 11-month-old daughter, Yuka, the killer wrote a letter to a friend that placed him at the center of Japan's capital punishment debate.</PARAGRAPH> <PHOTO> <TABLE WIDTH='250' ALIGN='RIGHT' BORDER='0'> <TR> <TD><IMG ALT='News photo' BORDER='0' SRC='../images/photos2006/nn20060520f2a.jpg' WIDTH='250' HEIGHT='183'/></TD> </TR> <TR> <TD><FONT SIZE='1'><B>Hiroshi Motomura, whose wife and child were murdered in Yamaguchi Prefecture by a minor in 1999, speaks to reporters in Tokyo on April 18 after hearing a session on the case at the Supreme Court. </B></FONT></TD> </TR> <TABLE> </PHOTO> <PARAGRAPH>'I've always been able to hurt others, run away and win. I won. Evil gets the first and last laugh,' he wrote in the note, which his friend revealed to the media.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>Describing the murders he committed on April 14, 1999, at the age of 18, the killer, who cannot be named because the was a minor at the time, said: 'A dog saw a cute dog. –

it just did it right there."

His flippant attitude at the time and during his trial outraged Yayoi's husband, Hiroshi, and prosecutors, who appealed the life sentence, demanding the death penalty.

But the appellate court upheld the Yamaguchi District Court's sentence, and the case is now before the Supreme Court. The court took receipt of the defense statement Thursday in which lawyers claimed the defendant did not intend to kill, but was only trying to silence their screams and panicked.

The court is expected to rule on the lower court sentence in the next few months.