現金受領、１００人全員を不起訴へ　河井夫妻選挙違反―東京地検

　２０１９年参院選をめぐる大型買収事件で、元法相の河井克行被告（５８）＝控訴中＝と案里元参院議員（４７）＝有罪確定＝から現金を受け取った地元広島の議員ら１００人全員について、東京地検特捜部が公選法違反（被買収）罪で不起訴とする方針を固めたことが６日、関係者への取材で分かった。起訴猶予になるとみられる。
　関係者によると、特捜部は克行被告側が強引に現金を渡しており、受け取った側の悪質性は低いと判断したもようだ。ただ、１００万円以上を受け取った議員らもおり、不起訴は波紋を呼びそうだ。
　克行被告らの一審判決によると、地元議員や首長ら４４人、後援会関係者５０人、選挙スタッフ６人の計１００人は、１９年７月の参院選で投票や票の取りまとめを河井夫妻から依頼され、同３～８月、現金を受け取った。
　総額は約２８７０万円で、最高額は亀井静香元衆院議員の元公設秘書の３００万円。ベテラン県議の１人は２００万円、最も少ない人は５万円だった。（2021/07/06-10:32）

Public prosecutors are unlikely to indict any of the 100 people who received cash from former Japanese Justice Minister Katsuyuki Kawai or his wife, Anri, in a high-profile vote-buying scandal related to her 2019 national election campaign, it was learned Tuesday.
   The Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office's special investigation squad believes that Katsuyuki, 58, forcibly gave cash to many of them and that the level of maliciousness of those who received the money was therefore low, according to sources familiar with the investigations.
   But the prosecutors' plan not to indict the 100 people over public offices election law violation is expected to stir controversy as some of them received as much as millions of yen.
   According to the court rulings handed down so far over the vote-buying case, the 100 people, including regional assembly members and local government leaders in Hiroshima Prefecture, western Japan, and members of a supporter group for Anri, received a total of some 28.7 million yen from the Kawais in March-August 2019 in return for voting for Anri or rounding up votes for her in the election in July that year for the House of Councillors, the upper chamber of the Diet, Japan's parliament. Running from the Hiroshima prefectural constituency, Anri, 47, won an Upper House seat for the first time in the election.
   A secretary of Shizuka Kamei, a former member of the House of Representatives, the lower chamber of the Diet, received the largest amount, 3 million yen, and a veteran Hiroshima prefectural assembly member was given 2 million yen. The lowest amount given per person was 50,000 yen.