大川小遺族の勝訴確定＝津波対策で学校に過失＝市、県の上告退ける・最高裁

　東日本大震災の津波で児童と教職員８４人が犠牲となった宮城県石巻市立大川小学校をめぐり、児童２３人の遺族が市と県に損害賠償を求めた訴訟で、最高裁第１小法廷（山口厚裁判長）は１０日付で、市と県の上告を退ける決定をした。震災前の津波対策で学校側に過失があったと認定し、遺族側勝訴とした二審仙台高裁判決が確定した。
　東日本大震災の津波訴訟で、事前の防災対策の不備を認めた判決が最高裁で確定したのは初めて。小法廷は詳細な理由を明示していないが、確定した判決は学校側に高度な安全管理義務を課しており、教育現場に影響を与えそうだ。（2019/10/11-13:20）

Japan's Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal against a high court ruling that ordered local authorities to pay damages over the deaths of elementary school children in the March 2011 massive tsunami.
   This is the first top court-fixed ruling acknowledging flaws in prior disaster prevention measures among lawsuits filed over the tsunami from the 9.0-magnitude earthquake that struck on March 11, 2011.
   The Supreme Court's First Petty Bench has not released details of its ruling, dated Thursday, that dismissed the appeal filed by Miyagi Prefecture and Ishinomaki, a city in the northeastern Japan prefecture. Still, the finalized ruling is expected to have repercussions on schools across the country as it suggests that school operators have a major responsibility for safety management.
   In the lawsuit filed by bereaved relatives of 23 students of now-defunct Okawa Elementary School in the city, Sendai High Court in April 2018 ordered the city and prefectural governments to pay a total of 1,436 million yen in damages. Seventy-four students and 10 staff members of the school were killed in the tsunami.
   Sendai District Court found in October 2016 that the school staff could not necessarily have predicted tsunami damage to the school in advance, noting that the school was not included in areas with risks of flooding on a tsunami hazard map created by local authorities. The court thus did not recognize a flaw in the municipally run school's antidisaster measures.