Akiko (Nakashima) Iriguchi

Although the top court dismissed the family's demand for compensation for the amount deducted from their benefits, their lawyers hailed the ruling as a landmark decision that cautions against rigid restrictions on how welfare recipients use the money.

The suit was brought by Toyoji Nakashima, a carpenter who died at age 61 while the case was being deliberated in the Fukuoka District Court, and his daughters, Akiko, 31, and Tomoko, 27.

They filed the suit in December 1991 against the director of the Fukuoka municipal welfare office for cutting the family's monthly benefits to ¥95,000 from ¥180,000 between July and December 1990.

The city cut the benefits after discovering that Nakashima had been paying ¥3,000 a month since 1976 into an education endowment insurance that yielded ¥450,000 upon maturity in June 1990. He was paying into the insurance to cover the cost of sending one of his daughters to high school.

The welfare office reportedly determined that most of the ¥450,000 constituted income for the family that would necessitate cuts in welfare benefits.

The Japan Times Weekly: March 27, 2004
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