DEATH PENALTY IN 1976 BOMBING UPHELD The supreme Court on Friday rejected the appeal from a man sentenced to death for the March 1976 bombing of the Hokkaido prefectural government building in Sapporo that killed two and injured 95. The court upheld the death penalty for Katsuhisa Omari, 44 of Tajimi, Gifu Prefecture, for deaths resulting from a time bomb attack protesting the appropriation of the northernmost main island of Hokkaido from the Ainu ethnic "imperialists". "It is unavoidable that the first and second rulings decided on the death penalty for the brutal crime that aimed at killing a large number of people indiscriminately ," Presiding Judge Katsuya Onishi said. Omori, who was arrested in August 1976 in connection with a separate bombing, has claimed that all charges against him are "fabrication." Omori is in prison in Sapporo, but issued a statement through supporters. "It is clear that is no proof of a crime and that I am not guilty," he said in the statement. "The Supreme Court is protecting and supporting the police and prosecutors who have fabricated the evidence." Omori's case has brought the number of people on deathrow to 59, according to a private group promoting a campaign punishment. Omori was convicted largely because investigators detected explosive materials on vinyl sheet thrown away by the defendant. The bomb blast damaged the first floor of the Hokkaido government building shortly after 9 a.m. March 2, 1976. A man claiming to be with the "East Asia Anti-Japanese Armed Front" later called a local newspaper to claim responsibility for the bombing, saying that a statement could be found in a coin locker at a subway station. The statement called on the Japanese people to destroy the "imperialist" rule over the Ainu, Okinawans,Koreans, Taiwanese, and all over the Asians. The ruling brings to a close, after 18 years, the major trials of former radicals in politically motivated bombings. Last February, the Supreme Court upheld the death penalty for former United Red Army members, Hiroko Nagata and Hiroshi Sakaguchi for the mass execution of their comrades and for the killing of policemen in a shootout between 1971 and 1972. this article from July 16, 1994 MAINICHI DAILY NEWS (normal newspaper) BOMB FOUND NEAR COURT OFFICIAL'S HOME A suspected timing device was found in front of the home of an official of the Supreme Court in Sunday, police said. A Family member of Yoshiyuki Iguchi, a secretary for Supreme Court Justice Katsuya Onishi, made an emergency call to police upon discovering a cardboard box in front of the home in Chofu, Tokyo. Police rushed to the scene and found a suspected time device and a bottle filled with something like gasoline inside the box. The device did not explode and nobody was injured. Last Friday, Justice Onishi rejected an appeal from an extremist sentenced to death for the March 1976 bombing of the Hokkaido prefectural government building in Sapporo Which killed two and injures d 95. this article from 19 July, 1994, MAINICHI DAILY NEWS (normal newspaper) Sender;ARP,P.O.Box 57, Sakyo Kyoto, 606 JAPAN E-mail;arpresist@igc.apc.org