Prosecutors on Thursday sought a 12-year prison sentence for Yukari Yamazaki, a former MUFG Bank employee charged with stealing cash and gold from customers' safe deposit boxes.
The defense said that a five-year prison term is enough for Yamazaki, 47, who has pleaded guilty to the charges.
The ruling will be handed down on Oct. 6.
Prosecutors pointed out that Yamazaki caused some ¥1.4 billion in financial damage to 70 customers since 2020. She committed the crimes to make up for losses in foreign exchange margin trading and horse race betting, they said.
She tried to avoid detection by performing the thefts outside business hours and turning off her personal computer so that safe deposit box access records would not remain, prosecutors said. Her acts betrayed the trust of employees and customers, they added.
The defense said that Yamazaki was mentally unstable at the time and that the crime was unplanned, adding that she is expected to be rehabilitated and has a low possibility of repeating the offense.
Yamazaki apologized and said she wants to atone for the crime and "return to society as soon as possible to repay as much as possible."
She has been indicted on charges of stealing 29 gold ingots worth about ¥333 million, about ¥61 million in cash and other items from six customers' safe deposit boxes between March 2023 and October 2024, when she worked at the bank's Nerima and Tamagawa branches in Tokyo.
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