Having serving 17 and a half years of a life sentence for the alleged abduction and murder of a four year old girl, Toshikazu Sugaya was released from prison after new DNA test results proved his innocence. Japan Video News links to an NHK news video with English v.o. Tokyo Mango says ‘Japan reinstated the jury system this year, which is great, but we need to make sure there are enough protections in place for the accused so they feel safe standing by their word.’ The Little Fish blog writes about The Innocence Project, which ‘tracks convicted criminals who were exonerated of their crimes after new DNA evidence was found in their favour’.