High School YouTuber Yutabon Withdraws Defamation Lawsuit Over Mistaken Identity

If Yutabon is sued…

The response document is included in the envelope sent from the court, and you do not have to attend the initial oral argument as long as you submit the response document. This allows you more time, during which you can visit free legal consultations held by city offices or bar associations, or consult with Legal Terrace, an organization established by the government to assist in resolving legal troubles. Attorney Kofuji continued.

Cases like Yutabon’s, where individuals face defamation on social media and end up mistakenly suing the wrong person, are not uncommon.

“In a lawsuit filed by the mother of wrestler Hana Kimura, who died by suicide in 2020, there was also a case of mistaken identity. They obtained a screenshot of a post that harmed the family’s feelings and used it to identify the poster, but it turned out that the screenshot itself was forged. Most of the posters who wrote defamatory comments about Hana deleted their tweets and accounts and fled, leaving the mother with no choice but to base her lawsuit on the screenshot of the post.

However, it seems that the wrongly accused suffered significant emotional distress and counter-sued the mother for 8.8 million yen in damages. Although the lawsuit was dismissed, it resulted in a rather unpleasant outcome,” said a judicial reporter from a national newspaper.

While Kofuji states that Yutabon’s case of mistaken identity “would certainly result in a loss if sued,” Mr. Honma says, “It seems like a simple mistake, so I’m not considering suing Yutabon.”

The defamation on social media has indeed created new victims, and such cases are likely to continue to increase in the future.