A Tokyo court on Tuesday upheld a suspended six-month sentence for former Nissan executive Greg Kelly, who was charged with assisting the company’s fugitive ex-CEO, Carlos Ghosn, in concealing income.
Both prosecutors and Kelly, a 68-year-old American, had appealed the 2022 verdict, but the Tokyo High Court rejected their challenges.
Kelly was arrested in 2018 alongside Ghosn, whose dramatic detention and subsequent escape sent shockwaves through the business world. Ghosn, who holds French, Lebanese, and Brazilian citizenship, fled Japan in 2019 while on bail, hiding in a music equipment box. Kelly, however, remained in Japan to face charges.
Following the initial verdict nearly three years ago, Kelly returned to the United States and has not attended the higher court hearings, his lawyer Yoichi Kitamura told AFP. However, Kitamura indicated that Kelly’s legal battle is not over.
“We will appeal to the Supreme Court,” Kitamura told reporters on Tuesday. “It’s not clear why our appeal was denied,” he added.
The prosecutors’ office declined to comment to AFP on whether they would pursue an appeal.
Kelly learned of the verdict by phone while at his home in the United States, said another of his lawyers, Tatsuo Ninoseki. No immediate comment was available from Kelly.
Prosecutors had originally sought a two-year prison sentence for Kelly, accusing him of helping Ghosn under-report his income by 9.1 billion yen (around $60 million). In 2022, Kelly was acquitted on charges related to the financial years 2010 to 2016 but was found guilty for the 2017 financial year. The court imposed a six-month prison sentence, suspended for three years.
Ghosn’s dramatic escape to Lebanon, where he remains at large, left Japanese prosecutors embarrassed. The former auto tycoon maintains he fled Japan to avoid an unfair trial.
In addition to the Japanese charges, French investigators have issued an international arrest warrant for Ghosn, accusing him of abuse of company funds and money laundering in connection with contracts linked to a Renault-Nissan subsidiary.
In December, Nissan and struggling Honda announced talks regarding a potential merger, a development that Ghosn said signaled Nissan was in “panic mode.”
AFP
