<Begin Segment 21>

MU: Now, was there one or two or three cases that stand out in your memory?

GK: Yes. Of course, those cases I tried stand out more. The first case I was assigned to was a trial of one army captain who was a commandant at a POW camp. And he was tried for causing the death of one American POW and bringing, bringing cruelties upon the other POWs.

MU: So what happened?

GK: Well, we, there I was assigned to defend this captain who was tried for causing the death of one American POW and others, for cruelties visited upon others. And I served -- there were about twenty or thirty American attorneys in the Defense section and we were teamed up. I teamed up with one other American attorney (...). And we were also assigned Japanese attorneys by the Japanese government so two of us with the two or three Japanese attorneys worked together to gather all the information and went to court to defend the Japanese. The first one I tried (...) resulted in death.

MU: Resulted in death?

GK: Death, and he was convicted and eventually executed by hanging.

MU: Can you describe the circumstances involved in the trial? How they reached that conclusion that he was to be executed and so on?

GK: Yes, the trial was based upon American method, but it was not American court system; neither was it the American court-martial system. It was something specially rigged up for the trial of war criminals. The basic procedure was drafted by General MacArthur and his legal section, which was more or less based upon the court-martial (procedure) with omission of a lot of amenities granted to the accused. In this trial, any statement -- sworn or un-sworn -- (was) admitted. In a normal trial, there would be affidavits prepared by the witnesses which will be used but then the writer of the affidavit himself would be placed on the stand for cross examination. But in a war crimes trial... well, maybe for the entire 800 trials of Japanese war criminals, maybe only about three or four Americans appeared as witnesses. And the rest of the trial was based upon the affidavits and statements made by the former American (...) POWs, and only on the documents. So in that respect, it was very unfair, and the trial procedure was something... maybe politically incorrect. But still, under the circumstances... that was the way a trial was conducted.

MU: The people who presented the affidavit didn't have to be cross-examined by the...

GK: No, they were not present so they would not be, could not be cross-examined. So whatever they wrote were accepted as fact. And maybe mistaken -- there were some cases of mistaken identity. Still, they were accepted. And when defense, it was defense job to show them that there was a mistaken identity. We had to produce somebody else, who were the true person that they intended. And then most of the charges were, bringing cruelty upon the POWs by not providing sufficient food, sufficient medical supplies, sufficient blankets during the wintertime, no heat in the barracks. Those were the cruelty, cause of cruelties. But then, that's the way the Japanese lived. (...) POWs were in the POW camps, they weren't given a special heating system or special blanket. That's the way Japanese prisoners were treated themselves; so it was the same treatment given to the POWs. That constituted cruelty under our system. People were tried, base commanders, camp commanders to start with, and then other guards, and other members of the camps. They were tried as war criminals.

MU: Let me see if I understand you correctly. Now, the treatment that the American POWs got was no worse than what the Japanese soldiers...

GK: That's right. (...) Japanese soldiers and Japanese prisoners' treatment wasn't (as) humane as in the United States (...). (...) That difference constituted cruelty. So our defense was to say that that was the treatment Japanese gave to the Japanese. No special cruelty intended for the American prisoners. But then, that defense...

MU: Didn't hold?

GK: No. [Laughs] Fell upon deaf ears of the commission or the judges. (And) the trial went on, started in the end of 1945 and ended in 1948. The first part of the trial, the sentences handed out, handed out were more severe, but the second half -- I guess the spirit of revenge waned -- and they received little bit more better understanding. So if you were tried the first half of the trial, you received more severe sentence or maybe death penalty. Toward the second half, they received more lenient sentences. There was some acquittals in the war crimes trial, but they all came during the second half of the trial. First half --

MU: When you say "first half," that means earlier part, earlier part of the trials and then later half --

GK: Until first part of 1948, the treatment was little bit more severe. Toward the end of '48 it was a little bit more lenient.

MU: Yeah, I've heard it said that, generally, a trial like that, "Vengeance comes to the fore first and then justice later."

GK: That's right.

MU: And is that about what happened?

GK: That was the basis for our defense. Vengeance, not justice, is what they were after. But during the first part, or early part of 1945, -6, -'7, and '48, that's what ruled. Toward the end, people became little bit tired, too, of the trial, and became little bit more considerate.

<End Segment 21> - Copyright © 1997 Densho. All Rights Reserved.