As for Michael Logan's July 27 letter, "What immunity from prosecution?": Frankly, I am not a legal specialist, especially in matters of the Status of Forces Agreement (between the United States and Japan). But Logan seems to believe that Japanese police can freely arrest off-duty U.S. service members suspected of committing crimes outside base fences and prosecute them exclusively under Japanese law.
In reality, this is simply not true. As practiced now, primary jurisdiction over U.S. service-member criminal suspects is in the hands of U.S. military authorities. The few who are serving time in Japanese prisons are those unfortunate enough to have been involved in high-profile criminal cases. They are the ones who were handed over to Japanese authorities due to "sympathetic consideration" by U.S. military authorities of the nature of the crimes (Article 17, 3c).
Japanese police cannot arrest a U.S. military criminal suspect until he is officially indicted. The problem is getting an official indictment without being able to directly interrogate the suspect immediately after his alleged criminal act. The suspect may escape possible prosecution by Japanese authorities because of legal formalities and the physical barriers between U.S. military bases and the civilian sector. He may be promptly discharged from military service and go home -- as if nothing has happened. There have been many such cases in Okinawa. And many of the victims had to eat dirt in sheer humiliation.
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