2
Introduction
On September 4, 1995, three off-duty United States Marines stationed on the Japanese
island of Okinawa abducted a 12-year-old schoolgirl outside a stationery store in the local
town of Kin. After pulling her into their rental car and beating her, they bound her
mouth, arms and legs with duct tape and gang-raped her. They were apprehended by
U.S. military authorities shortly afterwards. There was no question in anyone’s minds
that they had committed the crime; their bloody underwear was found in a plastic bag in a
nearby trash barrel.
1
The incident immediately propelled the issue of the U.S. military presence on the island
into the national and international spotlight. Residents of Okinawa were shocked at the
brutality of the incident, and were further incensed that U.S. officials refused to turn over
the perpetrators to Japanese authorities for more than three weeks afterwards. (The
turnover eventually occurred on September 29).
2
Almost instantly, outraged community
1
Chalmers Johnson, “The 1995 Rape Incident and the Rekindling of Okinawan Protest against the
American Bases,” in Okinawa: Cold War Island, ed. Chalmers Johnson (Cardiff, CA: Japan Policy
Research Institute, 1999), pp. 116-17.
2
According to one U.S. official with knowledge of the case, the Americans reacted slowly because the
incident was unprecedented, and they wanted to make sure they were doing a proper job of following the
rules of the U.S. Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) that governs U.S. military relations with Japan.
Under the SOFA, U.S. authorities are required to turn service members suspected of serious crimes over to
the Japanese justice system, but only after Japanese authorities issue a formal indictment. Okinawans,
however, tended to believe that the Americans were stalling, and trying to protect the guilty. Eventually the
three were tried in Japanese court, and ended up serving the seven-year prison sentences that are standard
for rape crimes in Japan.
Convention