A housewife in her 50s who was sentenced to seven years in prison shed tears at her trial.

Violence” from mother-in-law

At that time, the 1.5 million yen she paid to her husband as alimony was also paid out by her own mother.

After returning home, Watanabe’s mental condition worsened : “I couldn’t get up in the morning and couldn’t do my housework well. She had been visiting a psychosomatic medicine clinic, but stopped seeing the doctor on February 4, 2008.

When asked by the defense attorney why, he replied, “My mother-in-law told me, ‘If people find out that you go to the psychiatrist, my daughter won’t be able to marry a man. My mother-in-law is a person who cares about public opinion,” he replied.

After his mother passed away in August 2009, Watanabe began working at a day service in December of the same year.

The mother-in-law managed the cash card and bankbook of the account to which her wages were deposited,” said Watanabe.

However, in February of the following year, Watanabe resigned. After she quit her job, her mother-in-law’s behavior began to change. She began to harass Watanabe in various ways. When asked by the defense attorney, “What kind of harassment, for example? Watanabe testified, “She came into my room out of the blue and started harassing me with my bag.

He suddenly came into my room and threw the contents of my bag on the floor and verbally abused me, calling me a “scumbag.

The hardest thing of all was that he threw away a picture of his father that he cherished,” Watanabe said in a choked voice.

My father was a workaholic and rarely smiled, but there was a picture of him with a very nice smile, and I treasured it. When I found it discarded in a trash can upstairs, I was really shocked. ……”

The defense attorney explained that the mother-in-law must have been frustrated because the defendant, who earns only a few tens of thousands of yen a month, is not a money-grubber like she has been in the past. This unreasonable “harassing behavior” was found to be true during the trial.

In March 2011, the mother-in-law began to suspect that Watanabe had 1.5 million dollars hidden away, and persistently urged her to hand it over.

Whenever we were alone, she would ask me to give her 1.5 million every day. She even made me write a note saying, ‘I have only coins. I was also beaten with fists, had a kitchen knife held to my nose, and had kitchen bleach poured over my eyes.