1995 Okinawa rape incident

The 1995 Okinawa rape incident (Japanese: 沖縄米兵少女暴行事件) occurred on September 4, 1995, when three U.S. servicemen, 22-year-old U.S. Navy Seaman Marcus Gill, 21-year-old U.S. Marines Rodrico Harp, and 20-year-old Kendrick Ledet, all serving at Camp Hansen on Okinawa, rented a van and kidnapped a 12-year-old Okinawan girl. They beat her, duct-taped her eyes and mouth shut, and bound her hands. Gill and Harp then raped her, while Ledet claimed he only pretended to do so due to fear of Gill.^[1]

The offenders were tried and convicted in Japanese court by Japanese law, in accordance with the U.S.–Japan Status of Forces Agreement. The families of the defendants initially claimed that Japanese officials had racially discriminated against the men because they were all African American and coerced confessions from them, but later retracted the claims.^[2] The incident led to further debate over the continued presence of U.S. forces in Japan among Okinawans.^[3][4]

While the three perpetrators and a fourth unnamed US Marine were driving around, Gill had allegedly asked them if they had ever "thought of doing something crazy" which soon after prompted a conversation between all of them about how they would theoretically commit a rape, Gill claimed during testimony that Ledet had suggested doing it for real as they were about to drive Harp back to Camp Kinser,^[5] prompting them to head to a store at Kadena Airbase where Harp and Ledet would purchase condoms and electrical tape. The three would spend the next four hours searching for a target, at one point attempting to abduct a woman in an alleyway before she ran into a building after being accosted by Harp.^[6] At 8 p.m., the three saw the victim enter a general store where she had walked a short distance from her home to buy a notebook. After she exited, Harp approached her and asked for directions, and as this happened, Ledet punched her and grabbed her by the neck to pull her into the car while Harp assisted. While in the car, Harp taped her mouth, hands, and ankles together and Ledet put tape over her eyes. They had driven to Blue Beach Training area,^[7] where according to prosecutors Harp and Ledet would take her out of the car, before Gill removed the victim's pants, punched her in the face and abdomen, and shoved her back into the car where he raped her.^[8] Afterwards, according to Gill's testimony in court: him and Ledet made jokes about the crime before Ledet went back into the van after stripping down to his underwear, afterwards Harp went inside and raped her. After they drove off, the girl walked until she found a house where she called her mother and explained what happened. Her mother filed a complaint to the police who were able to quickly identify the men based on the victim's description, including the exact number on the license plate of the rental van.

Photographs of the suspects' faces have been virtually absent from Japan's media. News executives were concerned that public anger over the rape would be further inflamed and take on racist overtones if the race of the suspects were widely publicized. A US military public-affairs officer, speaking from the US military's Japan headquarters at Yokota, said he could not disclose the suspects' races out of respect for their privacy.^[9]

After the incident became known, public outrage began, especially over the U.S.–Japan Status of Forces Agreement, which gives the U.S. service members a certain measure of extraterritoriality (exemption from jurisdiction of local law) only as it relates to the place the suspects were detained. While the crime was committed away from a U.S. military base, the U.S. initially took the men into custody, on September 6.^[10] Although false rumors spread that the suspects were free to roam the base and had been seen eating hamburgers,^[11] the suspects were held in a military brig until the Japanese officials charged them with the crime.^[10]

Despite an immediate request by Japanese law enforcement for custody and eventual trial, the men were only transferred on September 29, after the Japanese had formally indicted them.^[10] This delay was in conformity with the Status of Forces agreement, which states, "The custody of an accused member of the United States armed forces or the civilian component over whom Japan is to exercise jurisdiction shall, if he is in the hands of the United States, remain with the United States until he is charged."^[12] Although the military drove the suspects to police headquarters in Naha for daily interrogations,^[13] the SOFA provision and the delay in transferring the suspects increased the outrage due to the attack, causing surge of Anti-American sentiment among Okinawans and Japanese in general.

The Okinawa Prefectural Assembly passed a resolution to protest against the actions of the U.S. military.^[14] On October 21 the anti-base movement reached its apex, a rally was held in Ginowan City to protest the incident and the US military bases.^[15] About 85,000 residents participated in the rally, including the Governor of Okinawa Masahide Ota. This was the largest protest in Okinawa since the treaty was signed in 1960.^[16][17] The then governor of Okinawa Masahide Ota even refused to sign the documents required by the US military base.^[18]

As a consequence of the protests regarding jurisdiction, the U.S. made concessions and agreed to consider transferring suspects to the Japanese before an indictment if the severity of the alleged crime warranted it.^[11][19] This agreement was decided at an emergency meeting between U.S. President Bill Clinton and Japanese Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto. The people of Okinawa also placed a full-page advertisement in The New York Times decrying the rape and other aspects of the U.S. bases in Okinawa.^{[citation needed]}

U.S. Navy Admiral Richard C. Macke was the commander of United States Pacific Command at the time of the attack. At a press conference during November 1995, Macke said of the men's actions: "I think it was absolutely stupid. I have said several times: for the price they paid to rent the car [used in the crime], they could have had a girl [prostitute]." These remarks were condemned as insensitive, and Macke was dismissed from his post and forced into early retirement. He was also reduced in rank to rear admiral (two-star) from full admiral (four-star), which reduced his pension from US$7,384/month to US$5,903/month.^[20]

Having been encouraged by his lawyer who told him that Japanese courts are generally more lenient to those who confess their crimes, and express remorse ^[21] Gill pleaded guilty to the rape, whereas the other two men insisted throughout the trial that they had not committed rape, but pleaded guilty to conspiracy. The trial concluded on March 7, 1996.^[22]

Gill had explained to the judges that he had been under a lot of work related stress in the weeks preceding the crime which were exacerbated by his orders for a transfer back to the US being canceled after he had failed his Physical Readiness Test for excess weight.^[23] His attorney would claim that this would also cause him to have homicidal ideation^[24]

On the trial session on December 11 of the same year, Harp's statement detailing his alleged roll in the kidnapping and rape was read allowed in court, when prompted by his attorney, Harp would say that he tried to correct investigators that he had never raped the victim, and that he had signed the statement confessing to his crimes under duress from American police, he had also said no when his lawyer asked if he had read the statement clearly before signing,^[25] he further went on to apologize for claiming he wasn't the one who bound the victim's hands during an earlier session. The trial itself suffered from complication as a result of the language barrier, with interpreters sometimes failing to translate the defendant's fast speech in its entirety.^[26] Gill would claim that his willingness to confess to the rape itself demonstrated that his contrition and account of events was the most trustworthy, boasting throughout the trail for having testified about the rape in detail, near the end of the trial he said to the panel of judges "How many of you could do what I have done today? regarding his testimony^[27]

Prosecutors had recommended sentences for the men, 10 years each. The judge sentenced Ledet to six and a half years, and sentenced Gill and Harp to seven years' imprisonment and hard labor, which at the time of the trial was considered a slightly longer than average punishment by Japanese standards.^[28] Their families also paid monetary reparation to the family of the victim, a common practice in Japan.^{[citation needed]}

The three men served prison terms in Japanese prisons and were released during 2003 and then given Other Than Honorable discharge from the military. After release, Rodrico Harp decried prison conditions in Japan and said that the electronics assembly prison labor he was forced to do amounted to slave labor.^[29]

Ledet, who had claimed he did not rape the girl, died in 2006 in an apparent murder–suicide in the United States. He was found in the third-floor apartment of Lauren Cooper, a junior Kennesaw State University student and acquaintance whom he had apparently raped and murdered by strangulation. He then ended his own life by using a knife to slice open his veins at the elbows.^[30]

In 2008, a movie named The First Breath of Tengan Rei based on the Okinawa incident was released.^[31]

During December 2011 then-Defense Minister Yasuo Ichikawa was the subject of a censure motion from the opposition Liberal Democratic Party for failing to know the details of the rape. This followed his subordinate Satoshi Tanaka speaking with reporters in a tavern and using euphemisms for rape to discuss relocating the US Futenma airbase. Satoshi Tanaka was terminated as director of the Okinawa Defense Bureau,^[32] and in the cabinet reshuffle of January 13, 2012, Ichikawa was replaced by Naoki Tanaka.^[33]

John Junkerman, director of Hellfire: A journey from Hiroshima, had intended to interview both of the surviving perpetrators for his film about Okinawa's contentious history with the US military presence, after attempting to get into contact with Gill, he gave up after speaking with Gill's mother, who told him that her son had no interest in talking about his life, during this time he would also be trying to receive an answer from Harp, who eventually expressed interest after several months, Junkerman interviewed him in his home in 2012 where he would speak for two and a half hours about the rape incident and the surrounding events.^[34]

Okinawan writer, Shun Medoruma would write his 2017 novel: "In the Woods of Memory" Which centers around multiple characters' experience with sexual trauma that occurred during the 1945 Battle of Okinawa, the 1995 incident is referenced twice in chapters that take place in the year 2005.

• Rape during the occupation of Japan
• 1945 Katsuyama killing incident
• 1955 Yumiko-chan incident
• 2002 Okinawa Michael Brown incident
• 2006 Yokosuka homicide
• 2008 Yokosuka homicide

General:

• Sexual assault in the U.S. military