Four men jailed 3-1/2 years for beating student to death

A 1998 file picture of Japanese English language student Nozumu Shinezaki (Shinozaki )left and Fred Craig.

Four Japanese men who admitted beating a fellow Japanese student to death have been jailed for 3-1/2 years with no minimum term.

The four were originally charged with murdering 22-year-old Nozomu Shinozaki at the Columbus Academy in west Auckland in February last year but today appeared in the High Court at Auckland for sentencing on manslaughter charges after pleading guilty last month.

They were charged with five others with the murder of Mr Shinozaki but murder charges against the other five were dropped when crucial witnesses refused to return from Japan to give evidence.

Murder charges against the four sentenced today were then reduced to manslaughter.

Ryu Fukushima, 24, Ryuji Hiraki, 28, Nobu Oshima, 20, and Masato Fujita, 21, learned within a few moments of Justice Laurenson beginning his sentencing today that they would be jailed for 3-1/2 years.

The judge said he did not want to prolong the stress of the four prisoners or anybody else in court today.

He said Mr Shinozaki was questioned about arson and theft at the academy but he failed to give answers that satisfied the four men and he was beaten until he died.

A pathologist said the beating was so severe it caused a fat embolism -- where fat enters the bloodstream.

The pathologist said in 40 years he had encountered a fat embolism only a few times and then only in the most severe beatings.

- NZPA