A 36-year-old former factory worker has been slapped with life imprisonment for the gang-rape and murder of a sophomore student from Ibaraki University in Japan back in 2004.
The Mito District Court sentenced Jerico Miro Lampano in the killing of the 21-year-old student, The Mainichi reported on Wednesday.
The ruling stated that Lampano and two unidentified accomplices planned to kidnap the student in the area on Jan. 31, 2004. Lampano and his accomplices then raped the girl and slashed her neck in a riverbank near the Miho village.
Lampano’s defense attorney’s sought a limited prison sentence for him, stating that he pleaded guilty and showed remorse over the crime.
The court decided to give him life imprisonment, as presiding judge Yoshihiro Ogasawara described the crime as “relentless and cruel.”
Meanwhile, Lampano’s two accomplices are on the loose as they have returned to the Philippines. Both have been placed on an international watch list.